JP Morgan Asset Management has converted a $5.3 billion mutual fund focused on developed market equities listed outside of North America into a fully transparent actively managed ETF.

JP Morgan has converted four mutual funds to ETFs this year.

The JPMorgan International Research Enhanced Equity ETF (JIRE US) has been listed on NYSE Arca with an expense ratio of 0.24%.

JP Morgan’s ‘Research Enhanced’ investment approach aims to provide similar risk characteristics compared to broad market performance benchmarks while harnessing insights from the firm’s extensive network of analysts to pursue incremental active management.

By taking a large number of small active positions – overweighting stocks the analysts find attractive and underweighting those they don’t – Researched Enhanced funds seek modest positive excess returns, compounded over time.

Typically, each strategy aims to achieve 0.75%-1.00% in annualized excess returns with tracking errors of approximately 0.75%-1.25% versus its benchmark.

The newly converted ETF is benchmarked against the MSCI EAFE Index which currently consists of 826 large and mid-cap companies from 21 developed market countries excluding the US and Canada.

JP Morgan has converted four mutual funds, each housing billions of dollars in assets, to ETFs in 2022. While JP Morgan has stated that JIRE will be its last ETF conversion this year, the firm offers a further two Researched Enhanced mutual funds, targeting US and emerging market equity universes and collectively housing $10bn in assets, highlighting the potential for future action.