FMAY vs XTR

FMAYCFT Vest U.S. Equity Buffer ETF - May

XTRCGlobal X S&P 500 Tail Risk ETF

In short

FMAY First Trust's May rung on a twelve-month buffer ladder: it absorbs the first 10% of the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust's price losses over a one-year stretch, trades that cushion for an upside cap, then resets every May.

XTR Most downside-protection ETFs sell away your upside to pay for it. XTR pays cash instead: it owns the S&P 500 stocks and buys 10% out-of-the-money puts every quarter, leaving the upside uncapped.

Stated mandate

FMAY The Fund seeks pre-fee, pre-expense returns linked to the price return of the State Street SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust, subject to a 17.09% upside cap and protection against the first 10% of losses during the current May outcome period.

XTR The Fund seeks to track the performance of the Cboe S&P 500 Tail Risk Index before fees and expenses.

Why people hold it

• FMAY Mechanically simple: across each one-year period it seeks to absorb the first 10% of the reference ETF's price decline, in exchange for an upside cap set at the May reset.ftportfolios.com
• Twelve monthly siblings (FJAN through FDEC) run the same 10% buffer on the same reference ETF, so entries can be laddered or rolled into a fresh period in any month.ftportfolios.com
• Built from exchange-listed FLEX options inside an ETF wrapper: daily liquidity, no surrender schedule, no minimum holding term.sec.govftportfolios.com
• Seasoned by buffer-fund standards: running since 2020 and carrying over a billion dollars, which puts it among the larger, longer-lived funds in this niche.

• XTR No cap on the gains. The hedge is bought with cash rather than funded by selling calls, so index rallies come through less the put premium and fees.sec.gov
• Costs 0.25%, well under half of what the defined-outcome funds it competes with typically charge for downside protection.
• Owns the roughly 500 S&P 500 stocks themselves, with the put position layered on top, rather than wrapping the index in a stack of options.sec.gov
• Rules-based and mechanical: puts are bought at 10% below the prevailing index level each quarter and held to expiration, with no manager guessing at timing.sec.gov

Worth knowing

• FMAY At 0.85% a year it costs more than the typical fund in its buffer peer group, and laddered alternatives such as BUFB charge a fraction of that.
• It follows price return only, so the reference ETF's dividends are left out, and the stated cap and buffer are quoted before fees and expenses.sec.gov
• Cap and buffer are designed for holders across the full outcome period; buy mid-period and your own numbers differ. Each May's new cap depends on market rates at the reset.ftportfolios.comsec.gov

• XTR Protection starts about 10% down and resets quarterly, so garden-variety dips are absorbed in full and the gap widens if the market rallies mid-quarter.sec.gov
• Insurance is not free. The quarterly premium is a steady cost against plain index exposure, and in calm markets the puts expire worthless.sec.gov
• A small fund that trades thinly, so limit orders matter and subscale products carry more risk of being closed than the category's giants.

Full FMAY profile⁠

Full XTR profile⁠