ETF News You Missed This Week - Oct. 20 - Oct. 24, 2025

It was one of the busiest weeks of the year for U.S. ETF issuers, with new launches spanning leveraged, income, and thematic strategies. The steady stream of activity highlights ongoing product innovation and investor demand.

It was an especially active week for U.S. ETF issuers, with new product launches spanning leveraged trading tools, income strategies, and thematic funds.

Tradr made headlines with the debut of nine new 2× daily leveraged ETFs on Cboe, offering amplified exposure to popular stocks including Bullish, DoorDash, Firefly Aerospace, Newmont, Opendoor, Sarepta, TeraWulf, IREN Limited, and QuantumScape.

Seven of the nine ETFs mark first-to-market leveraged offerings for their respective underlying stocks, signaling the firm’s ambition to dominate the fast-growing leveraged single-stock ETF niche.

Aberdeen expanded its U.S. footprint by converting two mutual funds into fully transparent active ETFs: AMUN, focused on ultra-short municipal income, and ASCI, targeting international small caps.

These conversions push Aberdeen’s U.S. ETF assets above $18 billion and strengthen its suite of cost-efficient active strategies.

First Trust also joined the week’s activity with the launch of the Buffer & Digital Return ETF (DGOC), which provides a 10% downside cushion on SPY alongside a fixed “digital return” if the index remains within a certain range. The fund resets annually and caters to investors seeking consistency amid market uncertainty.

Core Alternative Capital introduced the Optimized Equity Income ETF (OEI), combining large-cap equity exposure with a covered call and put overlay designed to generate monthly income while limiting drawdowns.

Meanwhile, Reckoner Capital launched the Reckoner BBB-B CLO ETF (RCLO), an actively managed fund investing in mezzanine tranches of collateralized loan obligations, aiming to balance yield and preservation of capital.

iShares continued to expand its outcome-oriented lineup with two Target Buffer ETFs, TENJ and TENM, each offering 10% downside protection on large-cap U.S. equities through options-based strategies. GraniteShares also grew its YieldBOOST™ suite with new META- and BABA-linked income ETFs, now bringing the strategy’s total assets above $600 million.

Defiance ETFs remained among the most aggressive issuers in the leveraged space. The firm launched QSU, a 2× daily leveraged ETF tied to QuantumScape, MPL tracking MP Materials, and IRE offering leveraged exposure to IREN Limited, a Bitcoin mining firm. Each product is designed for short-term tactical trading, underscoring the firm’s specialization in high-volatility, high-turnover products.

MFS joined the week’s launches with two actively managed equity funds, BRCE and BRIE, combining fundamental and quantitative research approaches across U.S. and international markets.

Roundhill continued expanding its WeeklyPay™ income lineup with four new single-stock ETFs—ARM, Alibaba, Costco, and Uber—each paying frequent distributions that will feed into the diversified WPAY ETF.

Tuttle Capital Management added the MSTR 0DTE Covered Call Income ETF (MSTK), a synthetic covered call fund selling same-day options on MicroStrategy to capture intraday volatility while maintaining long exposure.

Goldman Sachs entered the private markets proxy segment with GTPE, an ETF that tracks an MSCI index designed to replicate private equity-like returns through long/short positions in public equities.

Finally, Advisors Asset Management launched the actively managed AAM Crescent CLO ETF (CLOC), focusing on investment-grade CLOs with floating-rate exposure, while Franklin Templeton added two new active international equity funds: Putnam International Stock ETF (PGRI) and Templeton International Insights ETF (TINS), both pursuing long-term alpha through distinct research-driven strategies.