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Sep. 30, 2021
Wahed FTSE USA Shariah ETF
Wahed FTSE USA Shariah ETF
Investment Objective
The Wahed FTSE USA Shariah ETF (the “Fund”) seeks to track the total return performance, before fees and expenses, of the FTSE USA Shariah Index (the “Index”).
Fees and Expenses of the Fund
This table describes the fees and expenses that you may pay if you buy, hold, and sell shares of the Fund (“Shares”). You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries, which are not reflected in the table and Example below.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
None
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Management Fee0.50%
Distribution and/or Service (Rule 12b-1) Fees0.00%
Other Expenses0.00%
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses0.50%
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
None
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Management Fee0.50%
Distribution and/or Service (Rule 12b-1) Fees0.00%
Other Expenses0.00%
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses0.50%
Example
This Example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Fund with the cost of investing in other funds. The Example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all of your Shares at the end of those periods. The Example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Fund’s operating expenses remain the same. The Example does not take into account brokerage commissions that you may pay on your purchases and sales of Shares.
Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions your costs would be:
1 Year: $51
3 Years: $160
5 Years: $280
10 Years: $628
Portfolio Turnover
The Fund pays transaction costs, such as commissions, when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in the Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses or in the Example, affect the Fund’s performance. For the fiscal year ended May 31, 2021, the Fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 19% of the average value of its portfolio.
Principal Investment Strategies
The Fund uses a “passive management” (or indexing) approach to seek to track the total return performance, before fees and expenses, of the Index. The Index is composed of common stocks of large and mid-capitalization U.S. companies the characteristics of which meet the requirements of the Shariah and are consistent with Islamic principles as interpreted by subject-matter experts (each, a “Shariah-compliant company”).
FTSE USA Shariah Index
The Index is constructed using an objective, rules-based methodology and is comprised of those companies included in the FTSE USA Index that are determined to be Shariah-compliant companies based on their business activities and certain financial ratios, as described below. The Shariah-compliant companies are then weighted in the Index according to their market capitalization.
Companies that receive income in excess of 5% of their total revenue from Shariah-prohibited activities are removed from the list of companies eligible for inclusion in the Index. Examples of such activities include:
•Conventional finance (non-Islamic banking, finance and insurance, etc.);
•Alcohol production or sale;
•Pork related products and non-halal food production, packaging, and processing or any other activity related to pork and non-halal food;
•Casino management, gambling, or adult entertainment;
•Tobacco manufacturing or sale; and
•Weapons, arms, and other defense manufacturing.
Only those companies that pass the following financial ratios will be considered Shariah-compliant:
•Debt is less than 33.333% of total assets;
•Cash and interest-bearing items are less than 33.333% of total assets;
•Accounts receivable and cash are less than 50% of total assets; and
•Total interest and non-compliant activities income should not exceed 5% of total revenue.
The Index constituents are reviewed on an ongoing and annual basis to ensure that they continue to be Shariah-compliant companies. The Index is reconstituted quarterly. If it is discovered during an ongoing review that a non-compliant security has been included in the Index in error, the security is removed from the Index and the Fund within two business days following the discovery of the error. The Index’s constituent securities are also reviewed on both an on-going basis and annual basis by a Shariah consultant, Yasaar Limited, to determine if any of the constituents should be considered for potential income remediation or Purification. Purification is the process by which an investor donates certain income earned from his or her investment in the Fund because certain of the Fund’s investments unintentionally earned small amounts of income deemed to be prohibited by Shariah principles, such as interest income.  As discussed under “Dividend Purification,” the Fund publishes on its website the per share amount to be purified on a quarterly basis.
The Fund’s Investment Strategy
The Fund attempts to invest all, or substantially all, of its assets in the component securities that make up the Index. Under normal circumstances, at least 80% of the Fund’s total assets will be invested in the component securities of the Index. Wahed Invest LLC (the “Adviser”), the Fund’s investment adviser, expects that, over time, the correlation between the Fund’s performance and that of the Index, before fees and expenses, will be 95% or better.
The Fund will generally use a “replication” strategy to achieve its investment objective, meaning the Fund generally will invest in all of the component securities of the Index in approximately the same proportions as in the Index. However, the Fund may use a “representative sampling” strategy, meaning it may invest in a sample of the securities in the Index whose risk, return and other characteristics closely resemble the risk, return and other characteristics of the Index as a whole, when the Adviser believes it is in the best interests of the Fund (e.g., when replicating the Index involves practical difficulties or substantial costs, an Index constituent becomes temporarily illiquid, unavailable or less liquid, or as a result of legal restrictions or limitations such as tax diversification requirements that apply to the Fund but not to the Index).
The Fund generally may invest up to 20% of its total assets in securities or other investments not included in the Index, but which comply with Shariah principles and which the Adviser believes will help the Fund track the Index. For example, the Fund may invest in securities that are not components of the Index to reflect various corporate actions and other changes to the Index (such as reconstitutions, additions, and deletions). The Fund may also invest up to 20% of its total assets in cash and other investments, such as cash equivalents and shares of other investment companies, each of which will be compatible with Shariah principles. Uninvested monies will be held in non-interest-bearing accounts.
To the extent the Index concentrates (i.e., holds more than 25% of its total assets) in the securities of a particular industry or group of related industries, the Fund will concentrate its investments to approximately the same extent as the Index. The Fund is deemed to be “non-diversified,” which means that it may invest a greater percentage of its assets in the securities of a single issuer or a small number of issuers than if it was a diversified fund.
As of June 30, 2021, the Index had 229 constituents, and the four largest stocks and their weightings in the Index were Apple Inc. (16.11%), Tesla Inc. (3.96%), Johnson & Johnson (3.26%), and Proctor & Gamble (2.46%).
Principal Investment Risks
The principal risks of investing in the Fund are summarized below. The principal risks are presented in alphabetical order to facilitate finding particular risks and comparing them with those of other funds. Each risk summarized below is considered a “principal risk” of investing in the Fund, regardless of the order in which it appears. As with any investment, there is a risk that you could lose all or a portion of your investment in the Fund. Some or all of these risks may adversely affect the Fund’s net asset value (“NAV”), trading price, yield, total return and/or ability to meet its objective. The following risks could affect the value of your investment in the Fund:
•Equity Market Risk. The equity securities held in the Fund’s portfolio may experience sudden, unpredictable drops in value or long periods of decline in value. This may occur because of factors that affect securities markets generally or factors affecting specific issuers, industries, sectors or companies in which the Fund invests. Common stocks are generally exposed to greater risk than other types of securities, such as preferred stocks and debt obligations, because common stockholders generally have inferior rights to receive payment from issuers.
•ETF Risks. The Fund is an exchange traded fund (“ETF”), and, as a result of an ETF’s structure, it is exposed to the following risks:
◦Authorized Participants, Market Makers, and Liquidity Providers Concentration Risk. The Fund has a limited number of financial institutions that may act as Authorized Participants (“APs”). In addition, there may be a limited number of market makers and/or liquidity providers in the marketplace. To the extent either of the following events occur, Shares may trade at a material discount to NAV and possibly face delisting: (i) APs exit the business or otherwise become unable to process creation and/or redemption orders and no other APs step forward to perform these services, or (ii) market makers and/or liquidity providers exit the business or significantly reduce their business activities and no other entities step forward to perform their functions.
◦Costs of Buying or Selling Shares. Due to the costs of buying or selling Shares, including brokerage commissions imposed by brokers and bid/ask spreads, frequent trading of Shares may significantly reduce investment results and an investment in Shares may not be advisable for investors who anticipate regularly making small investments.
◦Shares May Trade at Prices Other Than NAV. As with all ETFs, Shares may be bought and sold in the secondary market at market prices. Although it is expected that the market price of Shares will approximate the Fund’s NAV, there may be times when the market price of Shares is more than the NAV intra-day (premium) or less than the NAV intra-day (discount) due to supply and demand of Shares or during periods of market volatility. This risk is heightened in times of market volatility, periods of steep market declines, and periods when there is limited trading activity for Shares in the secondary market, in which case such premiums or discounts may be significant.
◦Trading. Although Shares are listed for trading on The NASDAQ Stock Market, LLC (the “Exchange”) and may be traded on U.S. exchanges other than the Exchange, there can be no assurance that Shares will trade with any volume, or at all, on any stock exchange. In stressed market conditions, the liquidity of Shares may begin to mirror the liquidity of the Fund’s underlying portfolio holdings, which can be significantly less liquid than Shares.
•Market Capitalization Risk
◦Large-Capitalization Investing. The securities of large-capitalization companies may be relatively mature compared to smaller companies and therefore subject to slower growth during times of economic expansion. Large-capitalization companies may also be unable to respond quickly to new competitive challenges, such as changes in technology and consumer tastes.
◦Mid-Capitalization Investing. The securities of mid-capitalization companies may be more vulnerable to adverse issuer, market, political, or economic developments than securities of large-capitalization companies. The securities of mid-capitalization companies generally trade in lower volumes and are subject to greater and more unpredictable price changes than large capitalization stocks or the stock market as a whole.
•Market Events Risk. U.S. and international markets have experienced significant periods of volatility in recent years due to a number of economic, political and global macro factors, including the impact of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and related public health issues, growth concerns in the U.S. and overseas, uncertainties regarding interest rates, trade tensions and the threat of tariffs imposed by the U.S. and other countries. These developments as well as other events could result in further market volatility and negatively affect financial asset prices, the liquidity of certain securities and the normal operations of securities exchanges and other markets. As a result, the risk environment remains elevated.
•Market Risk. The trading prices of equity securities and other instruments fluctuate in response to a variety of factors. The Fund’s NAV and market price may fluctuate significantly in response to these and other factors. As a result, an investor could lose money over short or long periods of time. Beginning in the first quarter of 2020, financial markets in the United States and around the world experienced extreme and in many cases unprecedented volatility and severe losses due to the pandemic caused by COVID‑19, a novel coronavirus. It is unknown how long circumstances related to the pandemic will persist, whether they will reoccur in the future, whether efforts to support the economy and financial markets will be successful, and what additional implications may follow from the pandemic. The impact of these events and other epidemics or pandemics in the future could adversely affect Fund performance.
•Non-Diversification Risk. Because the Fund is “non-diversified,” it may invest a greater percentage of its assets in the securities of a single issuer or a lesser number of issuers than if it was a diversified fund. As a result, the Fund may be more exposed to the risks associated with and developments affecting an individual issuer or a lesser number of issuers than a fund that invests more widely. This may increase the Fund’s volatility and cause the performance of a relatively small number of issuers to have a greater impact on the Fund’s performance.
•Passive Investment Risk. The Fund is not actively managed and its Adviser would not sell shares of an equity security due to current or projected underperformance of a security industry or sector unless that security is removed from the Index or the selling of shares of that security is otherwise required upon a rebalancing of the Index as addressed in the Index methodology.
•Sector Risk. To the extent the Fund invests more heavily in particular sectors of the economy, its performance will be especially sensitive to developments that significantly affect those sectors. The Fund may invest a significant portion of its assets in the following sectors and, therefore, the performance of the Fund could be negatively impacted by events affecting each of these sectors.
◦Energy Sector Risk. The Energy Sector is comprised of energy, industrial, infrastructure, and logistics companies, and will therefore be susceptible to adverse economic, environmental, business, regulatory, or other occurrences affecting that sector. The Energy Sector has historically experienced substantial price volatility. At times, the performance of these investments may lag the performance of other sectors or the market as a whole. Companies operating in the Energy Sector are subject to specific risks, including, among others, fluctuations in commodity prices; reduced consumer demand for commodities such as oil, natural gas, or petroleum products; reduced availability of natural gas or other commodities for transporting, processing, storing, or delivering; slowdowns in new construction; extreme weather or other natural disasters; and threats of attack by terrorists on energy assets. Additionally, Energy Sector companies are subject to substantial government regulation and changes in the regulatory environment for energy companies may adversely impact their profitability. Over time, depletion of natural gas reserves and other energy reserves may also affect the profitability of energy companies.
◦Information Technology Sector Risk. The Information Technology Sector includes companies that offer software and information technology services, manufacturers and distributors of technology hardware and equipment such as communications equipment, cellular phones, computers and peripherals, electronic equipment and related instruments and semiconductors. The Fund is subject to the risk that the securities of such issuers will underperform the market as a whole due to legislative or regulatory changes, adverse market conditions and/or increased competition affecting the Information Technology Sector. The prices of the securities of companies operating in the Information Technology Sector are closely tied to market competition, increased sensitivity to short product cycles and aggressive pricing, and problems with bringing products to market.
◦Health Care Sector Risk. Companies in the Health Care Sector are subject to extensive government regulation and their profitability can be significantly affected by restrictions on government reimbursement for medical expenses, rising costs of medical products and services, pricing pressure (including price discounting), limited product lines and an increased emphasis on the delivery of healthcare through outpatient services. Companies in the Health Care Sector are heavily dependent on obtaining and defending patents, which may be time consuming and costly, and the expiration of patents may also adversely affect the profitability of these companies. Health care companies are also subject to extensive litigation based on product liability and similar claims. In addition, their products can become obsolete due to industry innovation, changes in technologies or other market developments. Many new products in the Health Care Sector require significant research and development and may be subject to regulatory approvals, all of which may be time consuming and costly with no guarantee that any product will come to market.
•Shariah-Compliant Investing Risk. Islamic principles restrict the Fund’s ability to invest in certain market sectors, such as financial companies and conventional fixed-income securities, and reduce the size of the overall universe in which the Fund can invest. The strategy to reduce the investable universe may limit investment opportunities and adversely affect the Fund’s performance, especially in comparison to a more diversified fund. Because Islamic principles preclude the use of interest-paying instruments, the Fund’s cash reserves do not earn income.
•Tracking Error Risk. As with all index funds, the performance of the Fund and its Index may differ from each other for a variety of reasons. For example, the Fund incurs operating expenses and portfolio transaction costs not incurred by the Index. In addition, the Fund may not be fully invested in the securities of the Index at all times or may hold securities not included in the Index.
•Underlying Index Risk. Neither the Adviser nor the Index Provider is able to guarantee the continuous availability or timeliness of the production of the Index. The calculation and dissemination of the Index values may be delayed if the information technology or other facilities of the Index Provider, data providers and/or relevant stock exchange malfunction for any reason. A significant delay may cause trading in shares of the Fund to be suspended. Errors in Index data, computation and/or the construction in accordance with its methodology may occur from time to time and may not be identified and corrected by the Index Provider or other applicable party for a period of time or at all, which may have an adverse impact on the Fund and its shareholders.
Performance
The following performance information indicates some of the risks of investing in the Fund. The bar chart shows the Fund’s performance for the most recent calendar year ended December 31. The table illustrates how the Fund’s average annual returns for the 1-year and since inception periods compare with those of the Index. The Fund’s past performance, before and after taxes, does not necessarily indicate how it will perform in the future. Updated performance information is available on the Fund’s website at https://funds.wahedinvest.com or by calling the Fund toll free at 1-855-976-4747.
Calendar Year Total Return
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The calendar year-to-date total return of the Fund as of June 30, 2021 was 11.60%. During the period of time shown in the bar chart, the highest quarterly return was 23.83% for the quarter ended June 30, 2020, and the lowest quarterly return was -21.02% for the quarter ended March 31, 2020.
Average Annual Total Returns(for periods ended December 31, 2020)
Wahed FTSE USA Shariah ETF
1-Year
Since Inception
(7/15/2019)
Return Before Taxes24.70%24.70%
Return After Taxes on Distributions24.35%24.31%
Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Shares14.78%18.95%
FTSE USA Shariah Index
(reflects no deduction for fees, expenses, or taxes)
25.48%25.52%
After-tax returns are calculated using the historical highest individual federal marginal income tax rates during the period covered by the table above and do not reflect the impact of state and local taxes. Actual after-tax returns depend on an investor’s tax situation and may differ from those shown. After-tax returns shown are not relevant to investors who hold their shares through tax-deferred arrangements such as an individual retirement account (“IRA”) or other tax-advantaged accounts.