The 2025 stock market rally was heavily concentrated in mega-cap technology names, but market strategists expect a broader rally in 2026 as earnings growth expands beyond the largest companies. Investors looking to participate in this potential rotation are turning to strategies that provide balanced exposure across all market sectors.
When investors buy the S&P 500, they assume they're getting balanced exposure to America's largest companies.
Information technology represented 34.4% of the S&P 500 at year-end 2025, creating concentration risk for investors with core equity portfolios heavily weighted toward mega-cap technology names, according to insights from SS&C ALPS Advisors. An equal sector investment approach offers a way to reduce this concentration while maintaining access to quality large-cap companies.
The ALPS Equal Sector Weight ETF (EQL) made its debut on 07/07/2009, and is a smart beta exchange traded fund that provides broad exposure to the Style Box - Large Cap Blend category of the market.
Increasing attention is currently paid to a small number of stocks commanding outsized (and record) percentages of widely followed cap-weighted indexes. Meanwhile, advisors and investors are reviewing the equal-weight methodology.
Owing in large part to the seemingly undaunted ascent of the Magnificent Seven stocks, concentration risk is a frequently discussed topic. It's also one that feels highly correlated to the price action of mega-cap growth stocks.
The AI/megacap growth trade isn't dead. But price action on November 20 suggests even Nvidia's (NVDA) recent earnings report may not provide enough near-term excitement to fuel the tech sector.
Looking for broad exposure to the Large Cap Blend segment of the US equity market? You should consider the ALPS Equal Sector Weight ETF (EQL), a passively managed exchange traded fund launched on July 7, 2009.
Launched on 07/07/2009, the ALPS Equal Sector Weight ETF (EQL) is a smart beta exchange traded fund offering broad exposure to the Style Box - Large Cap Blend category of the market.
The ALPS Equal Sector Weight ETF offers equal-weight exposure to all 11 GICS sectors, rebalanced quarterly. Compared to SPY, the weight of technology is divided by about 3, while the weights of materials, real estate, utilities, and energy are multiplied by about 3 to 5. EQL has value characteristics and suits investors seeking diversified sector exposure and lower tech risk, but it has underperformed SPY and two active sector rotation ETFs.
Jefferies, UBS and Citigroup lift S&P 500 targets as strong earnings and Powell's rate cut signals boost optimism.
The Magnificent Seven and a handful of other large-cap growth stocks continue captivating investors' attention. That potentially overshadows opportunities offered by more diverse strategies, including equal-weight ETFs.