The ETF Graveyard: This Has Been a Record Year for Closures

The ETF industry is on pace for another record year of launches. But there’s another record within reach: closures. About 250 funds have already been laid to rest in 2026, including leveraged bets that barely survived infancy and funds tied to ESG, the metaverse and cannabis. With about 2,500 products now buried in the ETF Graveyard, launching a fund is clearly no guarantee of longevity.

On this episode of Trillions, Eric Balchunas and Joel Weber — joined by Andre Yapp, a senior ETF research associate with Bloomberg Intelligence, and Todd Sohn, ETF strategist at Baird Strategas — take another tour through the ETF Graveyard. They examine which strategies died out this year, why leveraged ETFs account for so many of the casualties, and which funds closed despite having substantial assets or strong returns. And because some ETF ideas refuse to stay dead, they nominate a few fallen funds that might someday join the “Lazarus list” and get resurrected.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.