When you buy an exchange-traded fund, or ETF, your money is spread around many different investments. The actual investments depend on the purpose of the fund. Many ETFs track financial indexes such as the S&P 500. Others are designed to give you exposure to specific niches such as cannabis companies, or small companies, or healthcare companies. 

ETFs help make investing easy. You can screen exchange-traded funds through your brokerage firm and buy with one click, typically without paying commission. They trade like stocks, and some brokerages allow you to buy fractional shares of them. Many also have low expense ratios. Since you gain exposure to all of the different investments the ETF owns, you also get diversification without much effort. 

The big question, though, is whether you can actually become a millionaire by retirement just by investing in ETFs. 

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Source Fool.com