WOMEN RARELY MANAGE ETFS — MEET THE TEAM LOOKING TO CHANGE THAT

Five discuss how they plan to rise within the industry’s male-dominated ranks and what advice they have for women who wish to manage assets

The $6.5 trillion U.S. ETF industry boomed in 2022 as innovative product debuts and market volatility fueled a near-record number of launches. But the fanfare revealed a major flaw in the space: the lack of women helming the funds.

Just 11 percent of U.S. fund managers are women, a figure that hasn’t budged in the past decade, according to Morningstar. Fund management teams comprised exclusively of women make up a meager 2 percent of all equity, fixed income and diversified funds.

Emerge, a Toronto-based independent fund manager with a branch in Buffalo, N.Y., is striving to improve those figures with one of the first allwoman exchange-traded fund investment teams in the U.S. In September, the firm launched five U.s.-based

ETFS, each overseen by women, which will invest in companies that promote higher environmental, social and governance standards.

Part of the goal is to establish a pipeline for women to make the leap into portfolio management, according to Chief Executive Officer Lisa Langley. While gender pay gaps and a lack of support in managing work-life balance may be notable factors in the lack of women heading ETFS, a key issue is a lack of mentors, she adds.

“We’re not asking for charity. We’re asking for an opportunity,” Langley said in an interview. “There hasn’t been enough of us as a group at the table to say, ‘Hey, it can be done.’”

Still, it’s a difficult time to be launching new funds. Of all ETFS that were introduced in 2022, 67 percent are underwater. New ESG fund launches in the third quarter dropped 37 percent from the same period in 2021, and market concentration means that the average size of most sustainable funds is less than $100 million in assets, according to Bloomberg Intelligence.

Bloomberg sat down with the Emerge team — Langley, Cate Faddis, Jane Li, Josephine Jimenez and Catherine Avery — to discuss how they plan to rise within the industry’s male-dominated ranks, what advice they have for women who wish to manage assets and why ESG investing is so vital.

This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

Other than the lack of representation of women in this industry, what are some other factors that led to the creation of this team?

Langley: Morningstar was brave enough to put 11 percent on the num