ETF Shares, A New Entrant In Australia’s ETF Market, Debuts Three U.S.-Focused Strategies Tracking Solactive Indices

Solactive is pleased to announce its first-ever collaboration with ETF Shares, an emerging Australian ETF issuer, supporting the launch of three innovative ETFs designed to offer local investors differentiated access to U.S. equities. Each ETF benchmarks a distinct Solactive index, delivering focused exposure to American companies characterized by strong financial fundamentals, technological leadership, and transformative innovation, marking a strategic entry into the Australian market.

Amid rising uncertainty about the U.S. economic outlook, investors are turning to companies with consistent free cash flow and strong quality fundamentals, as these firms tend to have resilient business models, the ability to self-fund operations, and the financial strength to reward shareholders while navigating market volatility. These traits help reduce exposure to interest rate risk and create a more stable investment profile. To capture this, the Solactive United States Quality Cash Flow Index is built from the Solactive GBS United States 500, a liquid and tradable universe of the 500 largest U.S. companies. From this universe, only companies with at least 10 consecutive years of positive free cash flow are considered. These are then ranked by a combined quality score, and the top 100 are selected. Final index weights are determined by each company’s free-float market capitalization adjusted by its quality score.

A recent report by Goldman Sachs1 on the legacy of the 2000 tech bubble underscores the importance of sustainable profitability and financial discipline in equity investing. At the height of the bubble, 80% of U.S. tech firms had negative earnings; today, that figure has fallen to 15%, marking a fundamental shift toward stronger business models. For Australian investors, whose domestic equities are largely concentrated in financials and commodities, these three indices offer differentiated exposure to resilient and innovative U.S. sectors, enhancing diversification across both growth and quality dimensions.

The Solactive United States Technology Index tracks the performance of all technology sector companies within the Solactive GBS United States 500 Index. By combining a focused sector approach with a large-cap U.S. equity universe, the index captures the full breadth of the country’s leading listed tech players. To ensure consistency and investability, the index includes only one share class per company and applies stringent criteria for liquidity, classification, and listing. Constituents are weighted by free-float market capitalization, and the index is rebalanced quarterly to reflect the evolving structure of the U.S. technology sector.

The Solactive Magnificent 7+ Index is developed in response to the growing demand for transparent, rules-based strategies that accurately reflect market leadership in the U.S. technology space. It offers a high-conviction, equal-weighted alternative that balances exposure and mitigates single-stock risk. It selects the top 10 U.S.-listed technology companies by free-float market capitalization, based on clear eligibility criteria—including U.S. headquarters and NASDAQ listing—and includes three additional firms beyond the well-known “Magnificent 7” to broaden diversification. With quarterly rebalancing and a systematic construction approach, the index provides investors with efficient and scalable access to the companies at the forefront of technological innovation and equity market performance.

The ETFs are listed on 6th May on Cboe Australia.

Timo Pfeiffer, Chief Markets Officer at Solactive, commented: “Our collaboration with ETF Shares demonstrates how index design can be precisely aligned with investors’ current objectives—whether that’s capturing quality, accessing sector breadth, or targeting concentrated growth. These indices provide investors with effective tools to navigate shifting market dynamics while targeting fundamental strength and sector-specific growth opportunities.”

Cliff Man, CEO of ETF Shares, commented: “Australia has one of the fastest growing ETF markets in the world, with industry AUM growing on a CAGR of almost 30% over the past 10 years. Yet the industry remains very concentrated, with only five issuers developing new products. With the launch of ETF Shares, we hope to shake up this tightly knit industry and develop new products for consumers. We’re grateful to all the help Solactive has provided us along the way.”

1. 25 Years on; Lessons from the bursting of the technology bubble; GOLDMAN SACHS RESEARCH