Metaverse enthusiasm is spreading—slowly—in the exchange-traded fund industry. Part of the reason for the slow uptake may be because, from an investing perspective, no one can agree on what it is. 

No fewer than six ETFs exist with “metaverse” in their name. And that’s about all they share regarding portfolios. While each fund offers its own angle, they collectively hold only three stocks in common: Apple Inc., Snap Inc. and Take-Two Interactive Software Inc.

The seven ETFs, their assets under management and their inception dates are as follows:

• Roundhill Ball Metaverse ETF (METV), 6/30/2021, $488.8 million

• Fount Metaverse ETF (MTVR), 10/27/2021, $7.1 million

• Subversive Metaverse ETF (PUNK), 1/27/2022, $595,860

• Proshares Metaverse ETF (VERS), 3/15/2022, $6.6 million

• First Trust Indxx Metaverse ETF (ARVR), 4/19/2022, $2.5 million

• Fidelity Metaverse ETF (FMET), 4/19/2022, $12.8 million

• Global X Metaverse ETF (VR), 4/26/2022, $2.1 million

Roundhill’s METV leads the pack regarding size, and it was the first out of the gate, launching several months before the next entrant and gathering almost $489 million in assets. The smallest is PUNK, with less than $1 million in assets under management. The number of holdings in each fund ranges from 41 to 53 securities. All of the funds in the category except for PUNK track indexes.

Performance has been unimpressive. Year to date, METV and MTVR are down 44.86% and 33.5%, respectively, while the broad global market as represented by the iShares MSCI ACWI ETF (ACWI) is down just 18.93%.

Over the 12-month period, METV is down more than 45% compared with a loss of less than 18% for ACWI. Over the short term—the latest one- and three-month periods–metaverse funds and ACWI have performed similarly.

Year to date, almost all of the funds have seen modest inflows, except for the two funds that were listed prior to the start of the year. METV has seen outflows of nearly $26 million, while MTVR lost nearly $3 million.

Three Securities

The three stocks the metaverse ETFs hold in common may not on the surface appear to be metaverse stocks in the manner of Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc., which is staking its future on the virtual industry.

Apple, simply due to its size and the scope of its business, is featured in myriad thematic ETFs, though usually with a capped weighting lest it dominate the fund. Snap, on the other hand, is primarily a social media company. Finally, Take-Two Interactive is a holding company that publishes video games under multiple labels.

Apple’s weights in the funds range from 3.55% in PUNK to 11.88% in MTVR. For Snap, the range is 0.46% in PUNK versus 3.79% in METV, while weightings in Take-Two range from 1.74% in VERS to 5.13% in VR.