First Trust expands its Target Outcome ETFs® lineup to provide small cap exposure with FT Cboe Vest U.S. Small Cap Moderate Buffer ETF - May

• SMAY seeks to participate in the price returns of the iShares Russell 2000 ETF (IWM) up to a predetermined cap
• Provides a buffer against the first 15% of losses

First Trust Advisors L.P. (“First Trust”) a leading exchange-traded fund (“ETF”) provider and asset manager, announced today that it launched the FT Cboe Vest U.S. Small Cap Moderate Buffer ETF– May (Cboe: SMAY) (the “fund”). The fund is the latest addition to First Trust’s suite of Target Outcome ETFs^®, which has $9.5 billion in total net assets as of 4/28/23 and is among the fastest growing in the outcome oriented ETFs space.

“History has shown that remaining disciplined in the face of heightened market volatility has been critical for investors achieving their long-term goals. Target Outcome ETFs^® have grown increasingly popular among investment professionals because they are an effective tool to help clients gain exposure to stocks, while also mitigating downside risk,” said Ryan Issakainen, CFA, Senior Vice President, ETF Strategist at First Trust.

The fund seeks an outcome that provides investors with returns (before fees and expenses) that match the price return of the iShares Russell 2000 ETF (“IWM” or “underlying ETF”), up to a predetermined upside cap, while providing a buffer against the first 15% of potential losses over a specific Target Outcome Period. The fund is managed and sub-advised by Cboe Vest Financial LLC (“Cboe Vest”) using a “Target Outcome Strategy^®” or pre-determined target investment outcome. Cboe Vest is the creator of Target Outcome Investments^® and manager of the longest running buffer strategy fund.

Outcome period values:

The gross cap is before fees, expenses and taxes. The net cap is after fees and expenses, excluding brokerage commissions, trading fees, taxes and extraordinary expenses not included in the funds’ management fee. The upside cap is set by a fund on inception date of the Target Outcome Period and is dependent upon market conditions at the time. The cap investors will experience may be different than what is illustrated herein.

If an investor purchases shares after the first day of the Target Outcome Period, they will likely have a different return potential and buffer than an investor who purchased shares at the start of the Target Outcome Period and the buffer the fund seeks may not be available. At the end of the Target Outcome Period, the upside cap for the new Target Outcome Period is reset to prevailing market conditions. The fund has a perpetual structure and may be held indefinitely, providing investors a buy and hold investment opportunity.

“Today’s launch of SMAY satisfies a demand from investors seeking a risk-diversified way to participate in some of the upside potential of small-cap stock holdings, with a level of protection against losses,” said Jeff Chang, President of Cboe Vest.

Karan Sood, CEO, and Howard Rubin, Managing Director, Head of Portfolio Management, of Cboe Vest, will serve as portfolio managers for the funds. The portfolio managers are jointly and primarily responsible for the day-to-day management of the funds.

For more information about First Trust, please contact Ryan Issakainen at (630) 765-8689 or RIssakainen@FTAdvisors.com.

About First Trust

First Trust is a federally registered investment advisor and serves as the funds’ investment advisor. First Trust and its affiliate First Trust Portfolios L.P. (“FTP”), a FINRA registered broker-dealer, are privately held companies that provide a variety of investment services. First Trust has collective assets under management or supervision of approximately $194.6 billion as of April 28, 2023 through unit investment trusts, exchange-traded funds, closed-end funds, mutual funds and separate managed accounts. First Trust is the supervisor of the First Trust unit investment trusts, while FTP is the sponsor. FTP is also a distributor of mutual fund shares and exchange-traded fund creation units. First Trust and FTP are based in Wheaton, Illinois. For more information, visit www.ftportfolios.com.

About Cboe Vest:

Cboe Vest is the creator of Target Outcome Investments^®, which strive to buffer losses, manage volatility, amplify gains or provide consistent income to a diverse spectrum of investors. Today, Cboe Vest’s Target Outcome Strategies^® are available in mutual funds, exchange-traded funds (ETFs), unit investment trusts (UITs), collective investment trusts (CITs), variable insurance trusts (VITs) and customizable managed accounts / sub-advisory services. For more information visit www.cboevest.com or contact Linda Werner at lwerner@cboevest.com or 703-864-5483.

You should consider the fund’s investment objectives, risks, and charges and expenses carefully before investing. Contact First Trust Portfolios L.P. at 1-800-621-1675 or visit www.ftportfolios.com to obtain a prospectus or summary prospectus which contains this and other information about the fund. The prospectus or summary prospectus should be read carefully before investing.

Risk Considerations

You could lose money by investing in a fund. An investment in a fund is not a deposit of a bank and is not insured or guaranteed. There can be no assurance that a fund's objective(s) will be achieved. Investors buying or selling shares on the secondary market may incur customary brokerage commissions. Please refer to each fund's prospectus and SAI for additional details on a fund's risks. The order of the below risk factors does not indicate the significance of any particular risk factor.

There can be no assurance that an active trading market for fund shares will develop or be maintained.

A fund that uses FLEX Options to employ a "target outcome strategy" has characteristics unlike many other traditional investment products and may not be appropriate for all investors. There can be no guarantee that a target outcome fund will be successful in its strategy to buffer against losses. A shareholder may lose their entire investment. In the event an investor purchases shares after the first day of the target outcome period defined in the fund's prospectus ("Target Outcome Period") or sells shares prior to the end of the Target Outcome Period, the buffer that a fund seeks to provide may not be available.

A new cap is established at the beginning of each Target Outcome Period and is dependent on prevailing market conditions. As a result, the cap may rise or fall from one Target Outcome Period to the next and is unlikely to remain the same for consecutive Target Outcome Periods.

A target outcome fund will not participate in gains beyond the cap. In the event an investor purchases fund shares after the first day of a Target Outcome Period and the fund has risen in value to a level near the cap, there may be little or no ability for that investor to experience an investment gain on their fund shares; however, the investor will remain vulnerable to downside risk.

A fund that effects all or a portion of its creations and redemptions for cash rather than in-kind may be less tax-efficient.

A fund may be subject to the risk that a counterparty will not fulfill its obligations which may result in significant financial loss to a fund.

A fund is susceptible to operational risks through breaches in cyber security. Such events could cause a fund to incur regulatory penalties, reputational damage, additional compliance costs associated with corrective measures and/or financial loss.

Financial services companies are subject to the adverse effects of economic recession, currency exchange rates, government regulation, decreases in the availability of capital, volatile interest rates, portfolio concentration in geographic markets, industries or products, and competition from new entrants in their fields of business.

Trading FLEX Options involves risks different from, or possibly greater than, the risks associated with investing directly in securities. A fund may experience substantial downside from specific FLEX Option positions and certain FLEX Option positions may expire worthless. There can be no guarantee that a liquid secondary trading market will exist for the FLEX Options and FLEX options may be less liquid than exchange-traded options.

FLEX Options are subject to correlation risk and a FLEX Option's value may be highly volatile, and may fluctuate substantially during a short period of time. FLEX Options will be exercisable at the strike price only on their expiration date. Prior to the expiration date, the value of the FLEX Options will be determined based upon market quotations or other recognized pricing methods. In the absence of readily available market quotations for fund holdings, a fund's advisor may determine the fair value of the holding, which requires the advisor's judgement and is subject to the risk of mispricing or improper valuation.

Health care companies may be affected by government regulations and government health care programs, increases or decreases in the cost of medical products and services and product liability claims, among other factors. Many health care companies are heavily dependent on patent protection, and the expiration of a company's patent may adversely affect that company's profitability. Health care companies are also subject to competitive forces that may result in price discounting, may be thinly capitalized and susceptible to product obsolescence.

A fund may be a constituent of one or more indices or models which could greatly affect a fund's trading activity, size and volatility.

Industrials and producer durables companies are subject to certain risks, including the general state of the economy, intense competition, consolidation, domestic and international politics, excess capacity and consumer demand and spending trends. They may also be significantly affected by overall capital spending levels, economic cycles, technical obsolescence, delays in modernization, labor relations, and government regulations.

Large capitalization companies may grow at a slower rate than the overall market.

The portfolio managers of an actively managed portfolio will apply investment techniques and risk analyses that may not have the desired result.

Market risk is the risk that a particular security, or shares of a fund in general may fall in value. Securities are subject to market fluctuations caused by such factors as general economic conditions, political events, regulatory or market developments, changes in interest rates and perceived trends in securities prices. Shares of a fund could decline in value or underperform other investments as a result. In addition, local, regional or global events such as war, acts of terrorism, spread of infectious disease or other public health issues, recessions, natural disasters or other events could have significant negative impact on a fund. In February 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine which has caused and could continue to cause significant market disruptions and volatility within the markets in Russia, Europe, and the United States. The hostilities and sanctions resulting from those hostilities could have a significant impact on certain fund investments as well as fund performance. The COVID-19 global pandemic and the ensuing policies enacted by governments and central banks have caused and may continue to cause significant volatility and uncertainty in global financial markets. While vaccines have been developed, there is no guarantee that vaccines will be effective against future variants of the disease. Recent and potential future bank failures could result in disruption to the broader banking industry or markets generally and reduce confidence in financial institutions and the economy as a whole, which may also heighten market volatility and reduce liquidity.

Large inflows and outflows may impact a new fund's market exposure for limited periods of time.

A fund classified as "non-diversified" may invest a relatively high percentage of its assets in a limited number of issuers. As a result, a fund may be more susceptible to a single adverse economic or regulatory occurrence affecting one or more of these issuers, experience increased volatility and be highly concentrated in certain issuers.

A fund and a fund's advisor may seek to reduce various operational risks through controls and procedures, but it is not possible to completely protect against such risks. The fund also relies on third parties for a range of services, including custody, and any delay or failure related to those services may affect the fund's ability to meet its objective.

The prices of options are volatile and the effective use of options depends on a fund's ability to terminate option positions at times deemed desirable to do so. There is no assurance that a fund will be able to effect closing transactions at any particular time or at an acceptable price.

The market price of a fund's shares will generally fluctuate in accordance with changes in the fund's net asset value ("NAV") as well as the relative supply of and demand for shares on the exchange, and a fund's investment advisor cannot predict whether shares will trade below, at or above their NAV.

Securities of small- and mid-capitalization companies may experience greater price volatility and be less liquid than larger, more established companies.

If, in any year, a fund which intends to qualify as a Registered Investment Company (RIC) under the applicable tax laws fails to do so, it would be taxed as an ordinary corporation.

A target outcome fund 's investment strategy is designed to deliver returns if shares are bought on the first day that the fund enters into the FLEX Options and are held until the FLEX Options expire at the end of the Target Outcome Period subject to the cap.

Trading on an exchange may be halted due to market conditions or other reasons. There can be no assurance that a fund's requirements to maintain the exchange listing will continue to be met or be unchanged.

A fund that invests in FLEX Options that reference an ETF is subject to certain of the risks of owning shares of an ETF as well as the risks of the types of instruments in which the reference ETF invests.

The Underlying ETF may be susceptible to an increased risk of loss, including losses due to adverse events that affect the Underlying ETF's investments more than the market as a whole, to the extent that the Underlying ETF's investments are concentrated in the securities and/or other assets of a particular issuer or issuers, country, group of countries, region, market, industry, group of industries, sector, market segment or asset class.

A fund that invests in FLEX Options that reference an ETF has exposure to the equity securities market. Equity securities may decline significantly in price over short or extended periods of time, and such declines may occur in the equity market as a whole, or they may occur in only a particular country, company, industry or sector of the market.

First Trust Advisors L.P. is the adviser to the fund. First Trust Advisors L.P. is an affiliate of First Trust Portfolios L.P., the fund's distributor.

The information presented is not intended to constitute an investment recommendation for, or advice to, any specific person. By providing this information, First Trust is not undertaking to give advice in any fiduciary capacity within the meaning of ERISA, the Internal Revenue Code or any other regulatory framework. Financial professionals are responsible for evaluating investment risks independently and for exercising independent judgment in determining whether investments are appropriate for their clients.

Cboe® is a registered trademark of Cboe Exchange, Inc., which has been licensed for use in the name of the funds. The funds are not sponsored, endorsed, sold or marketed by Cboe Exchange, Inc. or any of its affiliates (“Cboe”) or their respective third-party providers, and Cboe and its third-party providers make no representation regarding the advisability of investing in the funds and shall have no liability whatsoever in connection with the funds.

The fund is not sponsored, endorsed, sold or promoted by iShares Russell 2000 ETF, BFA, or Russell (together with their affiliates hereinafter referred to as the "Corporations"). The Corporations have not passed on the legality or suitability of, or the accuracy or adequacy of, descriptions and disclosures relating to the fund or the FLEX Options. The Corporations make no representations or warranties, express or implied, regarding the advisability of investing in the fund or the FLEX Options or results to be obtained by the fund or the FLEX Options, shareholders or any other person or entity from use of the iShares Russell 2000 ETF. The Corporations have no liability in connection with the management, administration, marketing or trading of the fund or the FLEX Options.

Target Outcome Investments, Target Outcome Strategies and Target Outcome ETF are registered trademarks of Cboe Vest Financial.

Definitions

IWM – iShares Russell 2000 ETF is an ETF based on the Russell 2000 Index, which is comprised of the smallest 2000 companies in the Russell 3000 Index.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20230522005394/en/