COWZ: Popular Free Cash Flow Yield ETF Needs Change To Catch VFLO

Pacer US Cash Cows 100 ETF is rated 'hold' due to inferior growth and quality metrics versus VFLO, despite similar free cash flow yields. COWZ's strategy relies on historical free cash flows and lacks forward-looking growth screens, resulting in inconsistent portfolio-level growth rates and performance. VFLO's inclusion of expected free cash flow and an explicit growth screen leads to superior and more consistent fundamental balance. It also has substantially outperformed COWZ since its inception. I don't expect strategy enhancements anytime soon. However, Pacer has shown a willingness to address gaps like it did with CALF, and from a performance perspective, I think it's necessary. Nevertheless, VFLO seems to be beating COWZ at its own game, and for that reason, COWZ only earns a "hold" rating.