ETFis BioShares Biotechnology Products Fund buy tamam

BioShares Biotechnology Products Fund (BBP) which invests in companies

that have at least one primary product that's received FDA approval, is up roughly 42% since its inception at the end of 2014 compared to a loss of 4% for IBB during the same time frame.

BBP has a portfolio that has performed almost as well as can be expected, especially in 2017. Take a look at this chart with the year-to-date performance of the fund's biggest components.
Among the top 10 holdings, all have posted double-digit gains with seven components delivering 25%+ gains.

The other advantage the fund has is that a number of its holdings are in the sweet spot of being developed enough to generate meaningful revenue from their approved product line yet being small enough that they can be potential takeover targets.

Current holdings such as Exelixis (NASDAQ: Exel)and Acadia (NASDAQ: ACAD) have been rumored as potential takeover targets for a while so further action could be in store for the fund in the near future as well.

Equal weighting the mature biotech players has been a strategy that's paid off for investors in the last year. The relatively limited exposure to the likes of Celgene and Gilead, which are still nearly 50% off of

recent highs, has made the fund more attractive than its more well-known counterpart. This fund will underperform when the mega-cap biotech names begin to rally again, but over the long-term this ETF should hold up well to IBB given its more diversified portfolio.