A startup near San Francisco is entering the ETF business, debuting its first two funds.

Bruce Ivins Lavine NightShares / AlphaTrAI Funds, Inc. CEO

On Tuesday, Bruce Lavine, CEO of Corte Madera, California-based NightShares [profile], and Max Gokhman, chief investment officer, unveiled the NightShares 500 ETF (NSPY on the NSYE Arca, Inc.) and and the NightShares 2000 ETF (NIWM). Both ETFs debuted that day with an expense ratio of 55 basis points.

NightShares' funds are active ETFs of ETFs designed to capture what they're calling "the night effect," i.e. the overnight performance of the markets. (NSPY focuses on 500 large cap U.S. stocks, while NIWM focuses on 2,000 small cap U.S. stocks.) According to Lavine, there is "a large body of research" documenting the persistent power of the night effect.

NightShares sibling AlphaTrAI Funds is the investment advisor to both funds, which are series of Unified Series Trust, and Exchange Traded Concepts, LLC (ETC) serves as subadvisor. Gokhman (who is also CIO of AlphaTrAI) PMs the new funds alongside ETC's Todd Alberico, Brian Cooper, Andrew Serowik, and Gabriel Tan.

"We are giving investors exposure to broad equity markets focused on the overnight session, which can potentially improve performance and lower overall portfolio volatility," states Lavine, who is an iShares alumnus and formerly served as president of WisdomTree.

"This is a story we're excited to tell, and we look forward to tell, and we look forward to talking with institutions, advisors and the broader investor community about the potential benefits from integrating the night effect into their portfolios," states Gokhman, who previously led asset allocation for Pacific Life.

The new funds' other service providers include: Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. (BBH) as custodian and transfer agent; Cohen & Company, Ltd. as independent accounting firm; Ultimus Fund Solutions, LLC as administrator and fund accountant; Northern Lights Compliance Services, LLC, an Ultiumus affiliate, as provider of a chief compliance officer; and Northern Lights Distributors, LLC, an Ultimus subsidiary, as distributor.  

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