Is American Century US Quality Growth ETF (QGRO) a strong ETF right now?

The American Century U.S. Quality Growth ETF (QGRO - Free Report) was launched on 09/10/2018, and is a smart beta exchange traded fund designed to offer broad exposure to the Style Box - All Cap Growth category of the market.

What are smart Beta ETFs?

Market cap weighted indexes were created to reflect the market, or a specific segment of the market, and the ETF industry has traditionally been dominated by products based on this strategy.

Market cap weighted indexes offer a low-cost, convenient, and transparent way of replicating market returns, and are a good option for investors who believe in markeHowever, some investors believe in the possibility of beating the market through exceptional stock selection, and choose a different type of fund that tracks non-cap weighted strategies: smart beta.

Based on specific fundamental characteristics, or a combination of such, these indexes attempt to pick stocks that have a better chance of risk-return performance.

This area offers many different investment choices, such as simplest equal-weighting, fundamental weighting and volatility/momentum based weighting methodologies; however, not all of these strategies can deliver superior results.

Fund sponsor and index

QGRO is managed by American Century Investments, and this fund has amassed over $2.04 billion, which makes it one of the largest ETFs in the Style Box - All Cap Growth. This particular fund, before fees and expenses, seeks to match the performance of the AMERICAN CENTURY U.S. QUALITY GROWTH IND.

The American Century U.S. Quality Growth Index seeks to select securities of large and mid-capitalization U.S. companies with attractive growth and quality fundamentals.

Cost and other expenses

Expense ratios are an important factor in the return of an ETF and in the long-term, cheaper funds can significantly outperform their more expensive cousins, other things remaining the same.

With one of the cheaper products in the space, this ETF has annual operating expenses of 0.29%.

It has a 12-month trailing dividend yield of 0.20%.

Sector exposure and top holdings

Even though ETFs offer diversified exposure which minimizes single stock risk, it is still important to look into a fund's holdings before investing. Luckily, most ETFs are very transparent products that disclose their holdings on a daily basis.

For QGRO, it has heaviest allocation in the Information Technology sector --about 40.5% of the portfolio --while Healthcare and Industrials round out the top three.

Looking at individual holdings, Alphabet Inc Cl A Common Stock Usd.001 (GOOGL) accounts for about 4.08% of total assets, followed by Mastercard Inc A Common Stock Usd.0001 (MA) and Booking Holdings Inc Common Stock Usd.008 (BKNG).

The top 10 holdings account for about 29.08% of total assets under management.

Performance and risk

Year-to-date, the American Century U.S. Quality Growth ETF has added roughly 11.16% so far, and is up about 11.41% over the last 12 months (as of 11/20/2025). QGRO has traded between $83.67 $117.03 in this past 52-week period.

The ETF has a beta of 1.10 and standard deviation of 18.12% for the trailing three-year period. With about 189 holdings, it effectively diversifies company-specific risk .

Alternatives

American Century U.S. Quality Growth ETF is a reasonable option for investors seeking to outperform the Style Box - All Cap Growth segment of the market. However, there are other ETFs in the space which investors could consider.

iShares Morningstar Growth ETF (ILCG) tracks MORNINGSTAR US LARGE-MID CP BRD GRWTH ID and the iShares Core S&P U.S. Growth ETF (IUSG) tracks S&P 900 Growth Index. iShares Morningstar Growth ETF has $2.93 billion in assets, iShares Core S&P U.S. Growth ETF has $25.28 billion. ILCG has an expense ratio of 0.04% and IUSG changes 0.04%.

Investors looking for cheaper and lower-risk options should consider traditional market cap weighted ETFs that aim to match the returns of the Style Box - All Cap Growtht efficiency.