Understanding the Defiance Leveraged Long Income HIMS ETF (HIMY)

The Defiance Leveraged Long Income HIMS ETF (HIMY) is a leveraged ETF designed to generate income. It uses options to create payouts for investors, but it has recently experienced a significant decline in share price.

What this ETF is trying to do

HIMY is a leveraged, option-income ETF. This means it uses financial tools to amplify its strategy to generate cash distributions for shareholders. Unlike a standard index fund, this ETF focuses on creating high levels of income through its specific investment approach.

What the numbers show

The recent performance of HIMY shows a sharp decline in value.

• Current Price: $5.43

• Estimated Price (1 year ago): Approximately $24.38

• One-Year Price Return: -77.74%

• One-Year Total Return: -70.09%

• Year-to-Date (YTD) Price Return: -16.54%

• Year-to-Date (YTD) Total Return: -13.07%

The "price return" measures only the change in the share price. The "total return" includes both the share price change and the distributions paid out. In both cases, the ETF has seen a large decrease in value over the last year.

Income and Distribution Explanation

HIMY provides very high cash distributions. It usually pays out monthly and has made 16 payments in the last 12 months.

• Distribution Yield: 66.23%

• Trailing Distributions: $3.59 per share

It is important for beginners to know that a high distribution yield can be misleading. While the ETF pays out a large percentage, the total return is negative. This means the cash payments were not enough to offset the drop in the share price.

Price and NAV Erosion Explanation

The supplied data is sufficient to evaluate price erosion, but it does not include enough historical NAV-per-share data to confirm or rule out NAV erosion.

However, the price-based evidence is significant. HIMY has a severe erosion-risk flag and an erosion score of 10, which is labeled as "Severe price erosion." This means the share price has dropped substantially over time.

Pros

• High Income: The ETF provides frequent, high-percentage cash distributions to investors.

Cons

• Severe Price Decline: The share price has fallen significantly over the past year.

• Negative Total Return: Even with the high payouts, the overall return for the year is deeply negative.

• Low Income Grade: It has an income rating grade of "F."

Beginner Takeaway

HIMY is a high-risk ETF that pays out a large amount of cash but has lost a huge portion of its share price. For income investors, this highlights the importance of looking at total return rather than just the distribution yield. A high yield does not guarantee that your original investment (the principal) is safe.

Top Holdings (as of 2026-10-08):

• First American Government Obligs X: 0.57%