Making its debut on 09/28/2015, smart beta exchange traded fund John Hancock Multifactor Large Cap ETF (JHML) provides investors broad exposure to the Style Box - Large Cap Blend category of the market.
What Are Smart Beta ETFs?
For a long time now, the ETF industry has been flooded with products based on market capitalization weighted indexes, which are designed to represent the broader market or a particular market segment.
Market cap weighted indexes work great for investors who believe in market efficiency. They provide a low-cost, convenient and transparent way of replicating market returns.
If you're the kind of investor who would rather try and beat the market through good stock selection, then smart beta funds are your best choice; this fund class is known for tracking non-cap weighted strategies.
Based on specific fundamental characteristics, or a combination of such, these indexes attempt to pick stocks that have a better chance of risk-return performance.
The smart beta space gives investors many different choices, from equal-weighting, one of the simplest strategies, to more complicated ones like fundamental and volatility/momentum based weighting. However, not all of these methodologies have been able to deliver remarkable returns.
Fund Sponsor & Index
Because the fund has amassed over $1.16 billion, this makes it one of the larger ETFs in the Style Box - Large Cap Blend. JHML is managed by John Hancock. JHML seeks to match the performance of the John Hancock Dimensional Large Cap Index before fees and expenses.
The John Hancock Dimensional Large Cap Index comprises of a subset of securities in the U.S. Universe issued by companies whose market capitalizations are larger than that of the 801st largest U.S. company.
Cost & Other Expenses
For ETF investors, expense ratios are an important factor when considering a fund's return; in the long-term, cheaper funds actually have the ability to outperform their more expensive cousins if all other things remain the same.
Annual operating expenses for JHML are 0.29%, which makes it on par with most peer products in the space.
The fund has a 12-month trailing dividend yield of 0.96%.
Sector Exposure and Top Holdings
While ETFs offer diversified exposure, which minimizes single stock risk, a deep look into a fund's holdings is a valuable exercise. And, most ETFs are very transparent products that disclose their holdings on a daily basis.
For JHML, it has heaviest allocation in the Information Technology sector --about 28.5% of the portfolio --while Financials and Industrials round out the top three.
Looking at individual holdings, Apple Inc (AAPL) accounts for about 4.02% of total assets, followed by Nvidia Corp (NVDA) and Microsoft Corp (MSFT).
Its top 10 holdings account for approximately 22.63% of JHML's total assets under management.
Performance and Risk
Year-to-date, the John Hancock Multifactor Large Cap ETF return is roughly 11.83% so far, and is up roughly 20.31% over the last 12 months (as of 07/23/2026). JHML has traded between $73.62 $89.72 in this past 52-week period.
JHML has a beta of 0.97 and standard deviation of 14.01% for the trailing three-year period, which makes the fund a medium risk choice in the space. With about 782 holdings, it effectively diversifies company-specific risk .
Alternatives
John Hancock Multifactor Large Cap ETF is a reasonable option for investors seeking to outperform the Style Box - Large Cap Blend segment of the market. However, there are other ETFs in the space which investors could consider.
iShares Core S&P 500 ETF (IVV) tracks S&P 500 Index and the Vanguard 500 Index Fund ETF Shares (VOO) tracks S&P 500 Index. iShares Core S&P 500 ETF has $881.97 billion in assets, Vanguard 500 Index Fund ETF Shares has $979.69 billion. IVV has an expense ratio of 0.03% and VOO changes 0.03%.
Investors looking for cheaper and lower-risk options should consider traditional market cap weighted ETFs that aim to match the returns of the Style Box - Large Cap Blend
Bottom Line
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John Hancock Multifactor Large Cap ETF (JHML): ETF Research Reports
This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).