FTXN vs UMI

FTXNBFirst Trust Nasdaq Oil & Gas ETF

UMIDUSCF Midstream Energy Income Fund

In short

FTXN Most oil and gas ETFs just hand you the biggest drillers by size. FTXN screens the US oil and gas patch on factor signals instead, holding about 40 names weighted by those scores. A rules-based tilt on a famously cyclical sector.

UMI Most pipeline funds are index machines. UMI is a stock picker: sub-adviser Miller/Howard runs a concentrated book of US and Canadian midstream names, with current income as the stated first job and a payout that lands monthly.

Stated mandate

FTXN The Fund seeks to track the performance of the Nasdaq US Smart Oil & Gas Index before fees and expenses through an indexing strategy.

UMI The Fund seeks a high level of current income and, secondarily, capital appreciation. It actively invests at least 80% of net assets in equity securities of U.S. and Canadian midstream energy companies.

Why people hold it

• FTXN The "Smart" in the index name is literal: holdings are selected and sized by factor ranking, not market cap alone, so the largest producer doesn't automatically get the largest slot.ftportfolios.com
• About 40 holdings, all oil and gas. No utilities, no renewables filler, no diluting the theme you actually came for.ftportfolios.com
• Running since 2016 and it sticks tightly to the Nasdaq index it names in its prospectus. What the documents promise is what the portfolio delivers.
• Trades actively for a niche sector fund, so getting in and out is rarely the hard part.

• UMI Actively managed, not index-tracking. Miller/Howard screens midstream companies on income, distribution coverage, leverage and contract quality, and holds roughly 30 of them.uscfinvestments.com
• Current income is the declared primary objective and capital appreciation the secondary one, and the cash goes out monthly rather than quarterly.
• Canada is written into the mandate, not treated as a footnote: at least 80% of net assets go to equity in US and Canadian midstream companies of any size.uscfinvestments.com
• Direct MLP exposure is capped at 25% of total assets, the line that keeps the fund taxed as a regulated investment company instead of as a corporation.uscfinvestments.com

Worth knowing

• FTXN 0.60% a year is the price of the factor machinery. Plain cap-weighted rivals like XOP (0.35%) and IEO (0.37%) charge roughly half that for the same corner of the market.
• Concentrated, single-sector equity: the ride tends to follow the price of the barrel, with no defensive ballast when energy turns.
• A mid-sized fund, not one of the category's household-name giants, and it pays distributions quarterly rather than monthly.

• UMI Stock picking carries a price: the 0.85% expense ratio runs well above the median for its oil and gas cohort, where XOP and IEO sit near 0.35%.
• It trades thinly next to the big energy ETFs, so spreads can be wider and sizable orders need more care at the screen.
• About 30 names inside one slice of one sector, and the fund discloses that distributions can include return of capital, which reduces your cost basis.

Full FTXN profile⁠

Full UMI profile⁠