Canadian investment fund manager BMO Asset management has launched a new low volatility emerging markets exchange traded fund on the Toronto stock exchange, adding to its existing range of smart beta ETFs. The BMO Low Volatility Emerging Markets Equity ETF (ZLE) provides investors with exposure to emerging markets while navigating market volatility.

BMO launches smart beta emerging markets ETF on the Toronto Stock Exchange

The ETF is designed for investors looking for long-term growth through emerging market equities with greater downside protection than market-capitalization-weighted products. It provides exposure to a low beta weighted portfolio of emerging markets stocks. Beta measures the security’s sensitivity to market movements. The ETF also uses a rules based methodology to build a portfolio of less market sensitive stocks from a universe of emerging market large cap stocks. The ETF has 80 holdings with 96.87% in stock and the remainder in cash or cash equivalents.

Kevin Gopaul, Chief Investment Officer and Senior Vice President, BMO Asset Management Inc , said in a statement: “We’ve introduced this ETF to build on our successful lineup of low volatility ETFs and to provide investors with a wider range of regional options for their portfolios. With this new offering, our comprehensive suite now allows investors to benefit from Emerging Market exposures – along with Canadian, U.S. and International exposures – with lower risk than the broad markets.”

With the addition of this ETF, BMO now offers more than 70 listings, including seven in its low volatility suite. BMO ETFs launched in 2009 and have led the industry in net new inflows for the last five consecutive years (according to data from Bloomberg).

The underlying portfolio is rebalanced in June and reconstituted in December. The total expense ratio of the fund is 0.45%