American Century Investments Launches Three Additional Exchange Traded Funds

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Sep 12, 2018, 09:00 ET

KANSAS CITY, Mo., Sept. 12, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- American Century Investments today announced the further buildout of its suite of Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs). American Century Quality Diversified International ETF (QINT), American Century STOXX®¹ U.S. Quality Growth ETF (QGRO) and American Century Diversified Municipal Bond ETF (TAXF) are now available to clients and investors and are listed on the NYSE ARCA.

"We are building a line-up of ETFs that apply our unique insights to solve common investment problems and help investors achieve their goals," said Edward Rosenberg, senior vice president and head of ETFs for American Century. "We are excited to launch these additional funds."

American Century Quality Diversified International ETF and American Century STOXX U.S. Quality Growth ETF utilize American Century's Intelligent Beta² methodology, which systematizes many of the same attributes that fundamental research and security selection seek to identify, in a rules-based, indexed approach.

American Century Quality Diversified International ETF is a foreign large blend fund that seeks to enhance core international exposure. Its rules-based approach analyzes each stock's quality, growth and value characteristics to select individual securities. It also dynamically adjusts exposures in an effort to take advantage of prevailing market conditions.

American Century STOXX® U.S. Quality Growth ETF is a large-cap growth fund that seeks to enhance the core growth component of investor portfolios. The fund features a rules-based approach to identify stocks that feature a combination of quality and growth. The methodology distinguishes between stable growth and pure growth companies, dynamically allocating to each category and adjusting sector exposures, depending on the market environment.

Both funds will be managed by Senior Vice President and Portfolio Manager Peruvemba Satish and ETF Portfolio Manager Rene Casis. Satish leads American Century's global analytics team and joined the firm in 2014. Casis joined American Century in early 2018 after serving in ETF portfolio management roles with BlackRock, Barclays Global Investors (BGI) and 55 Institutional.

The third fund, American Century Diversified Municipal Bond ETF, is an actively managed municipal bond fund that combines investments in thoroughly researched high yield and investment grade municipal bonds. Designed for investors seeking current income, the fund dynamically adjusts investment grade and high yield exposures based on prevailing market conditions. Senior Vice President and Portfolio Manager Steven Permut and Vice President and Portfolio Managers Joe Gotelli and Alan Kruss are managing the fund. The firm's municipal team averages 24 years of industry experience coupled with an average tenure of 21 years with the firm.

"We now have five ETF funds available for clients and investors," Rosenberg said. "All of our ETFs feature institutional-quality management that draws on the firm's fundamental and quantitative expertise."

Today's launch of three more ETF funds caps a busy year for American Century. Since announcing its ETF initiative in the spring of 2017, the firm has made steady progress hiring key personnel, establishing relationships with ETF liquidity providers and laying the groundwork for a sustained presence in the ETF marketplace. Rosenberg joined the firm from Northern Trust's FlexShares in June 2017, followed by the November hiring of Matt Lewis as vice president and head of ETF implementation & capital markets. American Century also announced that it entered into an agreement with Precidian Investments, LLC to license the firm's ActiveShares^SM methodology in support of the potential launch of actively managed, non-transparent³ ETFs, subject to regulatory approval. In early 2018, the firm hired Rene Casis for the value ETF portfolio manager position and Sean Walker as an ETF specialist. Then the firm announced the launch of its first two ETFs in mid-January. Lastly, the firm named Margaret Dorn as ETF external specialist and Matthew Abatecola and Ross Kamovitch as ETF internal specialists in March.

American Century Investments is a leading global asset manager focused on delivering investment results and building long-term client relationships while supporting research that can improve human health and save lives. Founded in 1958, American Century Investments' 1,300 employees serve investment professionals, institutions, corporations and individual investors from offices in New York; London; Hong Kong; Sydney; Mountain View, Calif.; and Kansas City, Mo. Jonathan Thomas is president and chief executive officer, and Victor Zhang and David MacEwen serve as co-chief investment officers. Delivering investment results to clients enables American Century Investments to distribute over 40 percent of its dividends to the Stowers Institute for Medical Research, a 500-person, non-profit basic biomedical research organization. The Institute owns more than 40 percent of American Century Investments and has received dividend payments of $1.4 billion since 2000. For more information about American Century Investments, visit www.americancentury.com.

iSTOXX® American Century® USA Quality Value Index and iSTOXX® American Century® USA Quality Growth Index are the intellectual property (including registered trademarks) of STOXX Limited, Zurich, Switzerland ("STOXX"), Deutsche Börse Group or their licensors, which is used under license.iSTOXX® American Century® USA Quality Value Index and iSTOXX® American Century® USA Quality Growth Index are neither sponsored nor promoted, distributed or in any other manner supported by STOXX, Deutsche Börse Group or their licensors, research partners or data providers and STOXX, Deutsche Börse Group and their licensors, research partners or data providers do not give any warranty, and exclude any liability (whether in negligence or otherwise) with respect thereto generally or specifically in relation to any errors, omissions or interruptions in the iSTOXX® American Century® USA Quality Value Index, the iSTOXX® American Century® USA Quality Growth Index or their data.

Investment return and principal value of security investments will fluctuate. The value at the time of redemption may be more or less than the original cost. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.

VALQ, QGRO and QINT are not actively managed and the portfolio managers do not attempt to take defensive positions under any market conditions, including declining markets. The portfolio managers also do not generally add or remove a security from the funds until such security is similarly added or removed from the underlying index. Therefore, the fund may hold an underperforming security or not hold an outperforming security until the underlying index reacts. This may result in underperformance compared to the market generally. In addition, there is no assurance that the underlying index will be determined, composed or calculated accurately. While the index provider provides descriptions of what the underlying index is designed to achieve, the index provider does not guarantee the quality, accuracy or completeness of data in respect of its indices, and does not guarantee that the underlying index will be in line with the described index methodology. Gains, losses or costs to the fund caused by errors in the underlying index may therefore be borne by the fund and its shareholders.

KORP and TAXF: Actively managed ETFs that do not seek to replicate the performance of a specified index. To determine whether to buy or sell a security, the portfolio managers consider, among other things, various fund requirements and standards, along with economic conditions, alternative investments, interest rates and various credit metrics. If the portfolio managers' considerations are inaccurate or misapplied, the fund's performance may suffer. Generally, as interest rates rise, the value of the securities held in the fund will decline. The opposite is true when interest rates decline. Lower-rated securities in which the fund invests are subject to greater credit risk, default risk and liquidity risk.

QGRO and QINT: Historically, mid-cap stocks have been more volatile than the stock of larger, more established companies. Smaller companies may have limited resources, product lines and markets, and their securities may trade less frequently and in more limited volumes than the securities of larger companies.

QINT: International investing involves special risks, such as political instability and currency fluctuations. Investing in emerging markets may accentuate these risks.

TAXF: Investment income may be subject to certain state and local taxes and, depending on your tax status, the federal alternative minimum tax (AMT). Capital gains are not exempt from state and federal income tax. Lower-rated securities in which the fund invests are subject to greater credit risk, default risk and liquidity risk.

iSTOXX® American Century® USA Quality Value Index (underlying index) is a systematic, rules-based proprietary index that is owned and calculated by STOXX based on the STOXX 900 Index. The underlying index aims to dynamically allocate to both quality companies with sound fundamentals and attractive valuations and companies with sustainable income. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.

iSTOXX® American Century® USA Quality Growth Index (underlying index) is a systematic, rules-based proprietary index that is owned and calculated by STOXX based on the STOXX 900 Index. The underlying index aims to identify those securities that exhibit higher growth and quality characteristics relative to their peers. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.

¹STOXX is a registered trademark of STOXX Ltd.

The STOXX 900 index covers the largest 900 companies in the USA. The STOXX 900 Index is the intellectual property (including registered trademarks) of STOXX Limited, Zurich, Switzerland ("STOXX"), Deutsche Börse Group or their licensors, which is used under license. American Century STOXX U.S. Quality Value ETF is neither sponsored nor promoted, distributed or in any other manner supported by STOXX, Deutsche Börse Group or their licensors, research partners or data providers and STOXX, Deutsche Börse Group and their licensors, research partners or data providers do not give any warranty, and exclude any liability (whether in negligence or otherwise) with respect thereto generally or specifically in relation to any errors, omissions or interruptions in the STOXX 900 Index or its data.

²Intelligent Beta methodology: Emphasizes the use of alternative index construction rules to traditional market capitalization-based indexes. Intelligent Beta emphasizes capturing fundamental investment factors or market inefficiencies in a rules-based and transparent way.

³ Active non-transparent ETF: Exchange traded funds that are actively managed by a portfolio manager or team of managers without daily disclosure of portfolio holdings.

Exchange Traded Funds (ETF) are bought and sold through exchange trading at market price (not NAV), and are not individually redeemed from the fund. Shares may trade at a premium or discount to their NAV in the secondary market. Brokerage commissions will reduce returns.

You should consider a fund's investment objectives, risks, and charges and expenses carefully before you invest. The fund's prospectus or summary prospectus, which can be obtained at AmericanCenturyETFs.com, contains this and other information about the fund, and should be read carefully before investing.

Foreside Fund Services, Distributor not affiliated with American Century Investments Services, Inc.