Under normal circumstances, the Global Royalties ETF seeks to achieve its investment objective by investing at least 80% of its net assets, which include borrowings for investment purposes, in domestic and foreign, common and preferred stocks of publicly listed companies that earn, in normal circumstances, at least 80% of their revenue from royalty income, royalty-related income and intellectual property income.

A royalty is a payment or stream of payments received by an entity for the ongoing and contractual use, by another entity, of an asset, including copyrighted works, intellectual property, franchises, and natural resources. Royalties streams are created when the owner of physical assets or intellectual property rights (in industries including music, pharmaceuticals and information technology) licenses such rights or assets in return for royalty payments. Royalties also include extractive industry royalties, where in exchange for an ongoing or upfront payment a company will sell interests in future revenue or production. The aforementioned universe will therefore consist of companies that earn, in normal circumstances, at least 80% of their revenue from royalty income, royalty-related income and intellectual property income and be classified in one of the following sub-industries: healthcare and biotechnology, materials and metals & mining, communication services and media & entertainment, and the energy sector. The Fund may also invest in publicly-traded master limited partnerships (“MLPs”) and royalty trusts, unit trusts or closed-ended funds that meet the above criteria.

Under normal market conditions, the Fund will invest significantly (e.g., at least 40% of its assets, unless market conditions are not deemed favorable, in which case the fund would invest at least 30% of its assets) in companies organized or located in multiple countries outside the United States or doing a substantial amount of business in multiple countries outside the United States.

The Fund generally is expected to consist of more than 15 companies but not more than 100 companies. The number of constituents may change depending on the number of companies available for investment that meet the Fund’s criteria.

To be eligible for inclusion in the Fund, a company must have a market capitalization of at least $100 million and there is no upper limit on the market capitalization of a portfolio company. To be eligible for inclusion in the Fund, a company must have a three-month average daily traded value of at least $500,000.

The Fund’s investment strategy emphasizes current distributions and dividends paid to shareholders. The Adviser believes that a professionally managed portfolio of higher dividend paying companies in the healthcare and biotechnology, materials and metals and mining, communication services and media and entertainment, and the energy sector offer an attractive balance of income and growth, when earning through a royalty. The Adviser believes that the predominantly revenue-based nature of a royalty business reduces the cyclical, operational and financial risks of the underlying business and allows for a predictable income stream.

The Fund is classified as a “non-diversified” investment company under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended (the “1940 Act”), which means that it may invest a high percentage of its assets in a limited number of issuers.

The Fund will not engage in currency hedging and is expected to own foreign currency for short periods of time for the purposes of buying and selling non-US listed securities and collecting dividends and/or coupon payments from those securities.

The Fund relies on the professional judgment of its Adviser to make decisions about the Fund’s portfolio investments.

The basic investment philosophy of the Adviser is to seek to invest in companies within the aforementioned thematic universe that are attractively valued when compared to prospective royalty earnings streams. The Adviser’s security selection process for identifying companies within the aforementioned theme uses both “top down” idea generation (sector and company research) and “bottom up” security selection (valuation, fundamental, quantitative, qualitative measures) approaches.

In practice “top down” idea generation means fundamental sector research, quantitative tools (e.g. screening based on income generation capacity and balance sheet strength) and the Adviser’s own expertise, used together to narrow down the specific thematic research universe.

Once this is defined, “bottom up” security analysis involves the Adviser first combining a detailed fundamental research profile of each royalty company, assessing, among other things, business model, management incentives and track record, and balance sheet. This also involves analysis of the operating company that streams a portion of their revenues to the royalty company. Second, Adviser assesses the attractiveness of valuation, primarily using discounted free cash flow analysis.

The Adviser integrates environmental, social and corporate governance (“ESG”) considerations into its investment analysis. This is in support of both the objective of maximizing return and the broader analysis of risks associated with individual companies. The Adviser, however, does not use ESG considerations to limit, restrict or otherwise exclude companies or sectors from the Fund’s investment universe.

ESG factors in this context include, but are not limited to, the impact on or from climate change, natural resource use, waste management practices, human capital management, product safety, supply chain management, corporate governance, business ethics and advocacy for governmental policy.

As part of its investment analysis the Adviser will consider the following, which form part of a holistic assessment of each individual investment opportunity that itself determines selection of the highest conviction securities into the portfolio that the Adviser believes represent the best risk reward for investors:

In making these considerations the Adviser will use both internal and external data sources and analyses including, but not limited to, those provided by companies directly or by third parties. These considerations also inform monitoring of existing positions.

The Fund may engage in securities lending.