FTGS vs IMCG

FTGSCFirst Trust Growth Strength ETF

IMCGAiShares Morningstar Mid-Cap Growth ETF

In short

FTGS Growth with a credit check. FTGS holds about 50 US names that clear screens for return on equity, long-term debt against cash, and revenue and cash flow growth. Growth that funds itself, rather than borrows for it.

IMCG Growth investing usually means megacaps. IMCG works the middle of the market instead: roughly 300 mid-cap growth names, indexed since 2004, for six basis points a year.

Stated mandate

FTGS The Fund seeks results generally corresponding to the price and yield, before fees and expenses, of The Growth StrengthTM Index. Normally, it invests at least 80% of net assets in the common stocks and REITs comprising that Index.

IMCG The Fund seeks to track an index of U.S. mid-capitalization equities with growth characteristics. Its strategy uses representative sampling and generally invests at least 80% of assets in securities from the Underlying Index.

Why people hold it

• FTGS A quality gate wearing a growth label: return on equity, long-term debt versus cash, and revenue plus cash flow growth. Balance sheet first, story second.yahoo.com
• About 50 holdings, with REITs eligible alongside common stocks. Concentrated and a little unusual for a growth fund, which is the reason to hold it next to a cap-weighted index.
• The portfolio sticks to the mandate: at least 80% of net assets in the index's stocks and REITs, US large-cap growth, no drift into side bets.
• Since its 2022 launch it has grown into a multi-billion-dollar fund and trades regularly, so ordinary-sized orders are not fighting an empty book.

• IMCG 0.06% a year, one third of the 0.18% median for its growth-fund peer group. Mid-cap indexing at large-cap-index prices.
• The growth leaderboard is stacked with large-cap funds (VUG, SCHG, SPYG, VONG). IMCG covers the middle instead, holding about 300 mid-cap growth names.
• Sticks close to the Morningstar mid-cap growth index it follows, one of the tighter tracking jobs in its peer group.
• Running since 2004 under the iShares roof, with a multi-billion-dollar asset base behind it.

Worth knowing

• FTGS 0.60% a year is the entry fee, while plain-vanilla category giants like IUSG and VYM charge under a tenth of that. The screen has to earn the gap.
• With roughly 50 names, single stocks and sector tilts carry real weight, so results can wander well away from broad growth benchmarks in either direction.
• The live record starts in late 2022, a short history for judging how a fundamental screen behaves across different markets.

• IMCG Moderately traded rather than heavily traded, so bid-ask spreads can run wider than the megacap growth ETFs sitting beside it in the category.
• This is a size-and-style bet. Mid-cap growth companies tend to move more sharply than the broad market, in both directions.
• Distributions land quarterly, but a growth screen is not built around income.

Full FTGS profile⁠

Full IMCG profile⁠