WELCOME TO BLUE TRACTOR

Protect Your Edge.
Power Your Active ETF

Edge (noun) — A durable, quantifiable advantage in alpha generation, validated over multiple market cycles.

Your edge is your advantage — and Blue Tractor helps you protect it.

Our award-winning Shielded Alpha® semi-transparent ETF service safeguards fund IP and trading activity, while ensuring market makers maintain tight spreads and deep liquidity. The result – your ETF remains secure, efficient, and scalable.

Blue Tractor serves asset managers in the UK and Europe, the United States, Australia & Canada.

WELCOME TO BLUE TRACTOR

Preserve Your Edge.
Power Your Active ETF

Edge (noun) — A durable, quantifiable advantage in alpha generation, validated over multiple market cycles.

Your edge is your advantage — and Blue Tractor helps you preserve it.

Our award-winning Shielded Alpha® semi-transparent ETF service protects fund IP and trading activity while ensuring market makers maintain tight spreads and deep liquidity. The result: your ETF stays secure, efficient, and scalable.

Blue Tractor serves asset managers in the UK and Europe, United States, Australia & Canada.

Efficient Implementation

All workflow is in the Blue Tractor cloud - effortless for the portfolio manager

Cost-Effective

Predictable, transparent subscription pricing scaled to ETF AUM

Active ETF Challenge

Protecting the Portfolio Manager’s Edge

Active ETFs are expanding rapidly, driven by investor demand for innovative strategies that capture alpha.

But the standard fully transparent ETF structure exposes every holding and trade daily — turning your IP into an open book. Copycat and predatory traders – now armed with AI – can quickly unravel a portfolio manager’s strategy.

Traditional actively managed mutual funds never reveal portfolios daily — so why should an actively managed ETF?

Regulators worldwide have listened & now permit active strategies within a semi-transparent ETF structure — a solution that protects a portfolio manager’s edge while preserving all the benefits of the ETF wrapper.

Instead of full daily disclosure, semi-transparent ETFs publish a correlated tracking basket that shields portfolio IP, while still giving market makers the data they need to hedge risk and keep spreads tight.

Shielded Alpha® – an Active ETF’s Intellectual Property Firewall

Blue Tractor’s ETF tracking basket solutions are delivered by the Shielded Alpha® cloud service. Shielded
Alpha® is a family of semi-transparent ETF tracking baskets, ranging from an award-winning flagship
framework (developed for the U.S. ETF market, but applicable globally) to tailored, bespoke designs.

At their core, Shielded Alpha® tracking baskets deliver the optimal balance between:

Opacity for Asset Managers –safeguarding portfolio holdings and trading activity

Transparency for Market Makers –sufficient information to hedge risk and make effective
markets.

Regulators will pose the question: Does the semi-transparent ETF provide enough information for
market makers to ensure tight spreads and liquidity? Shielded Alpha® tracking baskets are designed
precisely to meet this test – optimized to give the capital markets what they need, while fully protecting
an asset manager’s edge.

THE SOLUTION

Shielded Alpha® - the ETF IP Firewall

Blue Tractor’s Shielded Alpha® cloud service powers a suite of semi-transparent ETF tracking basket solutions — from our award-winning flagship model, to bespoke baskets individually tailored to any portfolio manager’s strategy.

At their core, Shielded Alpha® tracking baskets deliver the optimal balance between:

Opacity for Asset Managers

Safeguarding portfolio holdings and trading activity

Transparency for Market Makers

Sufficient information to hedge risk and make efficient markets.

Regulators require semi-transparent ETFs to provide sufficient data for market makers to maintain tight spreads and liquidity.

Shielded Alpha® tracking baskets are precisely calibrated to meet this standard.

Workflow

Rapid, Efficient Implementation

Just one conversation with Blue Tractor and your market maker sets everything in motion.

We define your transparency comfort, align it with market requirements and generate a semi-transparent tracking basket that updates daily — protecting your ETF strategy while ensuring market efficiency.

1

Upload

When daily fund accounting is completed, your Custodian uploads the ETF portfolio to the secure Blue Tractor cloud.

2

Generate

Our algorithm instantly derives a correlated tracking basket with low tracking error.

3

Distribute

The tracking basket returns to the Custodian and is disseminated to market makers for next day’s trading.

Support Growth

As regulations and markets evolve, we stay engaged to ensure confidence and stability

The Shielded Alpha® cloud-hosted service runs on Microsoft Azure and integrates seamlessly with your Custodian’s back office workflow — requiring no daily input from the ETF portfolio manager.

Portfolio Manager Benefits

Using Shielded Alpha® Creates Opportunity for the Active ETF Manager

Protect Intellectual Property — portfolio holdings and trading activity remain shielded from copycats and predatory traders.

Use with Any Strategy & Asset Class - equity, fixed income, options, leverage, long/short; nothing is off the table.

Maintain Market Efficiency — tracking baskets ensure tight spreads, deep liquidity, and efficient trading.

Capture Growth — active strategies are the fastest-growing ETF segment.

Active funds ideal for the Shielded Alpha® semi-transparent ETF structure include:

Concentrated portfolios (any asset class)
An ETF share class of an unlisted mutual fund
SMID and All-Cap equity funds where it can be challenging to enter/exit positions
Any asset class or fund strategy where the manager is deeply concerned about revealing the proprietary “secret sauce”

PORTFOLIO MANAGER BENEFITS

Shielded Alpha® Generates Opportunity

Protect Intellectual Property — portfolio holdings & trades remain shielded from copycats and predatory traders.

Use with Any Strategy & Asset Class - equities, fixed income, options, leverage, long/short; nothing is off the table.

Maintain Market Efficiency — correlated tracking baskets with low tracking error ensures tight spreads, liquidity & efficient trading.

Capture Growth — active strategies are the fastest-growing ETF segment.

ETF Types Ideally Suited for Shielded Alpha®:

Concentrated portfolios across any asset class
ETF share classes of existing unlisted mutual funds
SMID and All-Cap equity strategies where entering or exiting positions can move the market
Any strategy where protecting proprietary investment insights — the portfolio manager’s “secret sauce” — is essential

HOW IT WORKS

Simple Steps to Smarter Accounting

Listen First

every market has its own requirements, and we begin by understanding yours

Adapt the Wrapper

Shielded Alpha® is flexible and can be tailored to different jurisdictions

Guide the Launch

from fund setup to filings, we support managers through the process

Support Growth

As regulations and markets evolve, we stay engaged to ensure confidence and stability

HOW IT WORKS

Implementation is Rapid and Efficient

It starts with one conversation with Blue Tractor and your lead market maker. We define your comfort level on disclosure, align it with market maker needs, and then generate an ETF semi-transparent tracking basket template that protects your strategy while enabling efficient markets. The template will dynamically change daily as your portfolio activity changes – always ensuring that your edge remains
protected.

Shielded Alpha® is a light-touch, cloud-hosted service that integrates seamlessly with your custodian’s workflow. No day-to-day input from an asset manager is required. Each day, your confidential ETF portfolio is securely uploaded, and in seconds, a semi-transparent tracking basket is generated and sent to market makers. The result: efficient markets for your ETF — and your strategy stays protected.

Shielded Alpha® protects your intellectual property while ensuring market makers always have what they need to hedge risk and keep spreads tight. Based in the U.S. and England, Blue Tractor’s award-winning service runs on Microsoft Azure and has been named “Best U.S. Semi-Transparent Provider” four years in a row by ETF Express.