ILDR vs TRFM: Grades, Fees and Holdings Compared

First Trust Innovation Leaders ETF

ILDRCNYSE Arca

AAM Transformers ETF

TRFMANYSE Arca

Overlap

23.1%by weight

Expense ratio

TRFM −0.26pt a year

ILDR0.75%TRFM0.49%

Avg volume · 30D

ILDR 1.3×the volume

ILDR53.6KTRFM40.1K

ILDR vs TRFM Performance

Oct 31, 2025 – Oct 30, 2026

+4.8%ILDR+5.8%TRFM

Expense ratio: ILDR 0.75%; TRFM 0.49%, better
Fund size: ILDR $335M; TRFM $313M
1Y total return: ILDR +4.8%; TRFM +5.8%, better
Yield (12M): ILDR 0.00%; TRFM No data
Holdings: ILDR 82; TRFM 266
Avg volume (30D): ILDR 53.6K sh, better; TRFM 40.1K sh
NAV per share: ILDR $36.05; TRFM $53.79
52W range

ETF.net Grade

Pillar letters and Scores for ILDR, TRFM, with each pillar’s weight
Pillar	ILDR	TRFM
Cost30% weight	F22	A81Higher
Mission25% weight	A86	Not scored
Risk15% weight	B62	B66Higher
Tradability15% weight	C52	A70Higher
Holdings10% weight	B64	A89Higher
Durability5% weight	B68Higher	C50

Rank among Disruptive Innovation funds

How we build Categories ›

Same Category. ILDR and TRFM are both graded against the same 30 Disruptive Innovation funds, so their Grades compare head to head.

Disruptive Innovation⁠

Category · 30 funds

See all 30 ›

TRFM ranks 3rd and ILDR 16th of 30 funds in the Disruptive Innovation Category.

Rank 1AXTiShares Future Exponential Technologies ETFScore 86
Rank 2AKOMPState Street SPDR S&P Kensho New Economies Composite ETFScore 83
Rank 3ATRFMAAM Transformers ETFScore 74
Rank 4AXITKState Street SPDR FactSet Innovative Technology ETFScore 73
Rank 15CGXDWGlobal X Dorsey Wright Thematic ETFScore 48
Rank 16CILDRFirst Trust Innovation Leaders ETFScore 44
Rank 16CTECHarbor Transformative Technologies ETF (TEC)Score 44

Our read on each fund

ETF.net Research

ILDRCFirst Trust Innovation Leaders ETF

TRFMAAAM Transformers ETF

In short

ILDR Most innovation ETFs hand the job to an index. ILDR hands it to First Trust's own managers, who pick roughly 60 US and non-US names across seven innovation themes, from advanced medicine to the energy revolution.

TRFM Most disruption funds buy the story. TRFM screens for companies actually writing R&D checks, then spreads the theme across a couple hundred US-listed names instead of a concentrated bet on thirty.

Stated mandate

ILDR The Fund seeks capital appreciation and normally invests at least 80% of its assets in U.S. and non-U.S. companies that may benefit from scientific and technological innovation, including automation, advanced medicine, networks, advanced computing, enhanced mobility, the energy revolution, and e-commerce.

TRFM The Fund passively tracks the total return of the Pence Transformers Index before fees and expenses. The index targets U.S.-listed equity securities of companies positioned to benefit from significant changes in consumer behavior and technological innovation.

Why people hold it

ILDR No index to hide behind. The managers pick the roughly 60 holdings themselves, so the lineup can shift as themes like automation and advanced computing evolve.stockanalysis.com
It stays on brief: at least 80% of assets must sit in companies tied to scientific and technological innovation, and the portfolio closely reflects that mandate.ftportfolios.com
Trading since 2021, with a mid-sized asset base and moderate volume, so it sidesteps the wide spreads common to thin thematic funds.
Lands in the upper half of its disruptive-innovation peer group, a crowded shelf where plenty of funds promise the same themes.

TRFM Candidates are screened on research-and-development spending, so names earn a slot with budget receipts, not just a narrative.nasdaq.com
0.49% a year, below the typical fee in its disruptive-innovation cohort, and it follows a published index rather than a manager's hunches.
Modified equal weighting across a couple hundred holdings keeps any single mega-cap from quietly becoming the whole theme.stockanalysis.com
Sits among the strongest implementations in its disruptive-innovation peer group on our review.

Worth knowing

ILDR At 0.75% a year it sits above the 0.65% peer median and well above index-based rivals like KOMP at 0.20%. Active stock-picking is what the premium buys.
Concentrated by design: about 60 names, tech-heavy, non-diversified. Single-stock and single-theme swings land harder here than in a broad market fund.aaii.com
Built for capital appreciation, not income. Payouts are not part of the mandate.

TRFM Not the cheapest door into the theme. Broader innovation rivals such as KOMP carry a lower expense ratio.
Trades thinly next to the category's giants, so the bid-ask spread can matter more to your cost than the fee does.
Launched in 2022, so the track record is short, and the index stays US-listed (ADRs count) rather than buying foreign shares directly.stockanalysis.com

Full ILDR profile⁠

Full TRFM profile⁠

ILDR vs TRFM Holdings

How ILDR and TRFM differ

Overlap by weight

23.1%

Shared holdings make up 71.1% of ILDR and 24.6% of TRFM.

Level by level

Holdings44 in both23.1%
Sector10 Sectors79.9%
Countryby domicile86.5%
Asset classEquity100%

Sector

Sector weights in ILDR and TRFM, widest gap first
Sector	More in ILDRMore in TRFM	ILDR	TRFM
Health Care	ILDR +13.3 points	13.3%	0.0%
Industrials	TRFM +10.0 points	11.5%	21.5%
Utilities	TRFM +6.6 points	2.3%	8.9%
Technology	TRFM +3.3 points	53.2%	56.5%
Consumer Discretionary	ILDR +2.7 points	8.6%	5.9%
Communication	ILDR +2.5 points	7.4%	4.9%
Financials	ILDR +0.8 points	2.4%	1.6%
Energy	ILDR +0.7 points	0.9%	0.2%
Consumer Staples	TRFM +0.3 points	0.0%	0.3%
Materials	ILDR +0.1 points	0.4%	0.3%

Country, concentration and asset class

Country by domicile

Country weights in ILDR and TRFM, widest gap first
Country	More in ILDRMore in TRFM	ILDR	TRFM
United States	ILDR +7.6 points	86.9%	79.3%
Japan	TRFM +4.4 points	0.0%	4.4%
China	TRFM +3.2 points	0.0%	3.2%
Ireland	ILDR +2.6 points	2.6%	0.0%
Canada	ILDR +1.4 points	2.8%	1.4%
Taiwan	TRFM +1.4 points	0.0%	1.4%
United Kingdom	TRFM +1.0 points	0.0%	1.0%
Brazil	TRFM +1.0 points	0.0%	1.0%
Other countries (13)	TRFM +0.7 points	7.7%	8.4%

Concentration

Weight in the 10 largest Holdings

ILDR44.1%
TRFM8.6%

Securities held

ILDR81
TRFM266

Asset class

ILDR: Equity
TRFM: Equity

Holdings

Only in ILDR37
In both44
Only in TRFM222

Only in ILDR

37 securities, 28.6% of ILDR by weight

Eli Lilly and Company4.02%
Siemens Energy AG1.62%
Schneider Electric SE1.58%
Neurocrine Biosciences, Inc.1.30%
Xometry, Inc. (Class A)1.08%
Ascendis Pharma A/S1.07%
Solaris Energy Infrastructure, Inc. (Class A)1.05%
BridgeBio Pharma, Inc.1.01%
Adyen NV0.92%
Mirum Pharmaceuticals, Inc.0.90%
Halozyme Therapeutics, Inc.0.90%
argenx SE0.89%
Madrigal Pharmaceuticals, Inc.0.85%
Robinhood Markets, Inc. (Class A)0.84%
Zebra Technologies Corporation0.84%
Figure Technology Solutions, Inc. (Class A)0.74%
Coinbase Global, Inc. (Class A)0.66%
Alkermes Plc0.62%
HP Inc.0.61%
Kymera Therapeutics, Inc.0.58%
Viridian Therapeutics, Inc.0.57%
Nurix Therapeutics, Inc.0.55%
IDEAYA Biosciences, Inc.0.53%
Rheinmetall AG0.53%
Leonardo DRS, Inc.0.53%
Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (Class A)0.48%
Cellebrite DI Ltd.0.47%
Ouster, Inc.0.46%
Modine Manufacturing Company0.45%
Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc.0.43%
MDA Space Ltd.0.34%
Quantinuum Inc. (Class A)0.32%
Planet Labs PBC (Class A)0.21%
Oklo Inc. (Class A)0.18%
Indie Semiconductor, Inc.0.18%
AST SpaceMobile, Inc.0.17%
NuScale Power Corporation (Class A)0.16%

Only in TRFM

222 securities, 75.4% of TRFM by weight

Texas Instruments Inc0.92%
Datadog Inc0.88%
Analog Devices Inc0.86%
Emerson Electric Co0.81%
Visa Inc0.80%
Cadence Design Systems Inc0.80%
Apple Inc0.79%
Ciena Corp0.78%
Lumentum Holdings Inc0.77%
Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co0.77%
AMETEK Inc0.76%
Rockwell Automation Inc0.75%
Southern Co/The0.74%
Cisco Systems Inc0.74%
American Electric Power Co Inc0.74%
Xcel Energy Inc0.74%
Astera Labs Inc0.73%
TransDigm Group Inc0.73%
Keysight Technologies Inc0.73%
Entergy Corp0.72%
Applied Materials Inc0.72%
Kla Corp0.72%
Amphenol Corp0.71%
Monolithic Power Systems Inc0.70%
Ge Aerospace0.70%
Parker-Hannifin Corp0.68%
Bloom Energy Corp0.67%
Snowflake Inc0.66%
Salesforce Inc0.65%
Lam Research Corp0.65%
Sandisk Corp0.64%
ASE Technology Holding Co Ltd0.64%
Coherent Corp0.64%
Western Digital Corp0.63%
Fortinet Inc0.63%
Corning Inc0.63%
Teradyne Inc0.62%
Seagate Technology Holdings PLC0.62%
Uber Technologies Inc0.61%
Advantest Corp0.60%
Boeing Co/The0.58%
Sap SE0.58%
Axon Enterprise Inc0.58%
DoorDash Inc0.57%
Howmet Aerospace Inc0.56%
Netflix Inc0.56%
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd0.56%
ASML Holding NV0.56%
Murata Manufacturing Co Ltd0.52%
PDD Holdings Inc0.52%

Weight gaps

All 44 Holdings in both funds, largest gap first.

Holding weights in ILDR and TRFM, widest gap first
Holding	More in ILDRMore in TRFM	ILDR	TRFM
NVIDIA CorporationNVDA	ILDR +9.07 points	9.76%	0.69%
Amazon.com, Inc.AMZN	ILDR +5.24 points	5.94%	0.70%
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.AMD	ILDR +4.73 points	5.66%	0.93%
Alphabet Inc. (Class A)GOOGL	ILDR +3.56 points	4.18%	0.62%
Broadcom Inc.AVGO	ILDR +2.81 points	3.53%	0.72%
Microsoft CorporationMSFT	ILDR +2.33 points	3.10%	0.77%
Marvell Technology, Inc.MRVL	ILDR +1.98 points	2.72%	0.74%
Micron Technology, Inc.MU	ILDR +1.91 points	2.64%	0.73%
Oracle CorporationORCL	ILDR +1.89 points	2.56%	0.67%
Shopify Inc. (Class A)SHOP	ILDR +1.79 points	2.41%	0.62%
Arista Networks, Inc.ANET	ILDR +1.54 points	2.26%	0.72%
Eaton Corporation PlcETN	ILDR +1.42 points	1.95%	0.53%
Tesla, Inc.TSLA	ILDR +1.37 points	2.17%	0.80%
Rubrik, Inc. (Class A)RBRK	ILDR +1.30 points	1.63%	0.33%
Toast, Inc. (Class A)TOST	ILDR +0.73 points	0.94%	0.21%
NextEra Energy, Inc.NEE	ILDR +0.55 points	1.24%	0.69%
Everpure, Inc. (Class A)P	ILDR +0.53 points	0.84%	0.31%
ServiceNow, Inc.NOW	ILDR +0.51 points	1.04%	0.53%
Zscaler, Inc.ZS	ILDR +0.47 points	0.78%	0.31%
Dell Technologies Inc. (Class C)DELL	ILDR +0.47 points	1.15%	0.68%
MongoDB, Inc.MDB	ILDR +0.46 points	0.68%	0.22%
AeroVironment, Inc.AVAV	ILDR +0.38 points	0.59%	0.21%
Meta Platforms, Inc. (Class A)META	ILDR +0.36 points	1.12%	0.76%
Semtech CorporationSMTC	ILDR +0.36 points	0.59%	0.23%
Forgent Power Solutions, Inc. (Class A)FPS	ILDR +0.34 points	0.55%	0.21%
Spotify Technology S.A.SPOT	ILDR +0.33 points	0.86%	0.53%
Intel CorporationINTC	TRFM +0.32 points	0.43%	0.75%
Synopsys, Inc.SNPS	TRFM +0.30 points	0.54%	0.84%
Palantir Technologies Inc. (Class A)PLTR	ILDR +0.29 points	1.09%	0.80%
Vistra Corp.VST	TRFM +0.25 points	0.44%	0.69%
Palo Alto Networks, Inc.PANW	ILDR +0.24 points	1.09%	0.85%
Carpenter Technology CorporationCRS	ILDR +0.22 points	0.36%	0.14%
Reddit, Inc. (Class A)RDDT	ILDR +0.21 points	0.40%	0.19%
CrowdStrike Holdings, Inc. (Class A)CRWD	TRFM +0.19 points	0.71%	0.90%
Cloudflare, Inc. (Class A)NET	TRFM +0.18 points	0.60%	0.78%
GE Vernova Inc.GEV	ILDR +0.15 points	0.85%	0.70%
BWX Technologies, Inc.BWXT	ILDR +0.14 points	0.33%	0.19%
Rambus Inc.RMBS	ILDR +0.12 points	0.36%	0.24%
Karman Holdings Inc.KRMN	ILDR +0.11 points	0.34%	0.23%
Constellation Energy CorporationCEG	TRFM +0.10 points	0.56%	0.66%
Block, Inc. (Class A)XYZ	ILDR +0.09 points	0.75%	0.66%
Vertiv Holdings Co (Class A)VRT	TRFM +0.09 points	0.56%	0.65%
Airbnb, Inc. (Class A)ABNB	TRFM +0.04 points	0.60%	0.64%
IonQ, Inc.IONQ	ILDR +0.03 points	0.21%	0.18%

All 81 ILDR holdings⁠All 270 TRFM holdings⁠

How we measure overlap

Each holding counts at its smaller weight in the two funds, summed over the full Holdings. Sector, country and asset class use the same rule on each fund’s split. Cash, FX and derivative lines stay out of the counts. Two bond funds get no overlap figure.

ILDR vs TRFM Cost

Overpaying ILDR vs TRFM

$4,690

On $10,000 over 30 years. 7% growth a year before fees, expense ratio only.

ILDR 0.75%
$14,482
TRFM 0.49%
$9,792

Amount$10,000

Years30 years

Cost over time

ILDR 0.75%
TRFM 0.49%
Overpaying

Year by year

Year	ILDR	TRFM	Overpaying
10	$1,336	$883	$453
20	$5,078	$3,394	$1,684
30	$14,482	$9,792	$4,690

Expense ratio

0.75%ILDR
0.49%TRFM, cheaper

TRFM0.49%ILDR0.75%

0.20%0.90%

Middle half of Disruptive Innovation funds
Median 0.65%

TRFM 4th cheapest of 30 funds

ILDR 20th cheapest of 30 funds

ILDR vs TRFM Dividends

Last 12 months to Oct 30, 2026

Yield (12M): ILDR 0.00%; TRFM No data
Payout (12M): ILDR None; TRFM No data
Last payment: ILDR No data; TRFM $0.08
Ex-dividend: ILDR No data; TRFM Dec 31, 2025
Paid on: ILDR No data; TRFM Jan 5, 2026
Frequency: ILDR No data; TRFM Irregular

Distribution history

Per share, 2021 to 2026, same scale for both

ILDR1 paymentAll ILDR payments⁠

TRFMIrregular · 1 paymentAll TRFM payments⁠

ILDR vs TRFM Risk

Fall from peak · 5 years

This chart needs five years of history for both funds.

Risk facts

VolatilityStd dev, 3 years: ILDR 22.8%, betterTRFM 23.3%
Return per unit of riskSharpe ratio, 3 years: ILDR 1.07, betterTRFM 1.02
Worst fallMax drawdown, 5 years: ILDR −44.6%TRFM −28.4%since Jul 2022
Market sensitivityBeta, 5 years: ILDR 1.55TRFM 1.64; Market = 1

ILDR and TRFM in the news

All news⁠

ETF Filings
Golden Eagle files a second ETF without the 40% sales rule of the fund it already runs
Oct 8, 2026ILDR

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ILDR vs TRFM

In short

Stated mandate

Why people hold it

Worth knowing

How ILDR and TRFM differ

Level by level

Sector

Country, concentration and asset class

Country by domicile

Concentration

Asset class

Holdings

Only in ILDR

Only in TRFM

Weight gaps

Cost over time

Year by year

Distribution history

Fall from peak · 5 years

Risk facts

Golden Eagle files a second ETF without the 40% sales rule of the fund it already runs

How ILDR and TRFM differ

Level by level

Sector

Country, concentration and asset class

Country by domicile

Concentration

Asset class

Holdings

Only in ILDR

Only in TRFM

Weight gaps