Bill Nygren and his team are directly entering ETF world, with a familiar active value equity offering.

William C. "Bill" Nygren Harris Associates L.P. Partner, U.S. CIO

Yesterday (Tuesday, December 3), Nygren, partner and U.S. chief investment officer at Harris Associates L.P. (Harris|Oakmark), unveiled the Chicago-based fund firm's first ETF, the launch of the Oakmark U.S. Large Cap ETF (OAKM on the NYSE Arca, Inc.). Harris|Oakmark (a subsidiary of Paris-based Natixis Investment Managers [profile], which is part of Group BPCE) serves as investment advisor and administrator to the new, actively managed fund.

OAKM's inception date was yesterday, and the new ETF comes with an expense ratio of 59 basis points (which bakes in a 5bps fee waiver promised through January 27, 2027). As of yesterday, the new fund had $20.1 million in AUM.

The PM team for OAKM includes: Robert Bierig, partner and portfolio manager at Harris|Oakmark; Michael Nicholas, partner and PM; and Nygren. That's the same team that PMs a 33-year-old, $10.077-billion-AUM, Harris|Oakmark open-end mutual fund: the Oakmark Fund.

Nygren confirms that the similarity between the Oakmark Fund and the new OAKM is no accident. He spoke about the launch today at the "Natixis Investment Managements 2025 Outlook and Annual Media Luncheon" at Four Twenty Five in New York City. (Dave Goodsell, exeutive director of Natixis IM's center for investor insight, moderated the discussion, which also featured: Mike Acton, managing director and head of North America reesearch and strategy at AEW Capital Management; Pramila Agrawal, PM and head of the custom income strategies group at Loomis, Sayles & Company; and Jack Janasiewicz, PM and lead portfolio strategist of Natixis Investment Managers Solutions.)

"The way we look at it at Harris|Oakmark is, if we have an investment strategy, we want to be able to provide that in the product that appeals most to each group of potential investors," Nygren tells Goodsell. "We have our large cap strategy available as a separate account, we have it available as the Oakmark Fund, and as of yesterday it's now available in OAKM, our ETF."

"The reason we launched it is because there are a lot of investors that highly value the convenience and transparency that you get in an ETF," Nygren adds. "Investors also value the tax efficiency relative to most no-load MFs. We're proud of the job we've done on tax efficiency in the Oakmark no-load fund, but we think that the ETF is likely to deliver similar tax efficiency."

Nicolas and Bierig describe the new ETF as combining the team's "value investing experience with the benefits of an active ETF."

(It appears that OAKM will come with slightly lower fees than even the cheapest share class of the Oakmark Fund, given that ETFs separate out some costs that open-end mutual funds normally bake in. In contrast with the new ETF, that open-end fund offers four share classes: Investor shares for 32bps more than OAKM, thanks largely to 21bps in shareholder service fees; Advisor shares for 70bps; Institutional shares for 68bps; and R6 shares for 63bps.)

OAKM is a series of the Harris Oakmark ETF Trust. The new ETF's other service providers include: Deloitte & Touche LLP as independent accounting firm; ACA's Foreside Fund Services, LLC as distributor; K&L Gates LLP as counsel; and State Street Bank and Trust as custodian, dividend paying agent, securities lending agent, shareholder servicing agent, and transfer agent.

Editor's Note: Though OAKM is the first ETF directly offered by Harris|Oakmark, the firm is not a complete stranger to ETF world. Harris|Oakmark has been a subadvisor in the space at least once. And its parent, Natixis IM, has been moving into the ETF space with other boutiques for well more than decade. 

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