Scientific Beta

ETF.com: "The Global X Scientific Beta Japan (SCIJ) is a smart-beta take on Japan’s total equity market, and one that’s not even a year old yet. Still, this young—small—fund, with less than $12 million in assets, is delivering an impressive performance relative to the giants in the space."

ETF.com 21/03/2016

"(...) The Global X Scientific Beta Japan (SCIJ) is a smart-beta take on Japan’s total equity market, and one that’s not even a year old yet. Still, this young—small—fund, with less than $12 million in assets, is delivering an impressive performance relative to the giants in the space. SCIJ is a multifactor fund that invests in Japan’s 500 largest stocks. The fund picks its securities based on value, size, low volatility and momentum. These factors are measured by price-to-book ratio, free-float market capitalization, historical volatility over a two-year period, and one-year-minus-one-month total returns, respectively. The holdings are then weighted in the portfolio based—again—on a multifactor approach that strives to diversify risk. (...) SCIJ and other multifactor funds look to hone in on factors that have a track record of outperforming market-cap-weighted strategies. And since inception, SCIJ has delivered just that. From its launch on May 12, 2015 to date, SCIJ has slipped 1.2%, while EWJ is down 10% in the same period. DXJ is down nearly twice that, with a 19% loss—a far steeper decline associated to the strengthening of the yen against the dollar in the period. (...)"