Pro Spotlight: ETFs Are in Her DNA

Q: The ETF landscape has become quite competitive over the past few years. How did you end up specializing in ETFs?

A: It is a competitive business. A lot of us in the ETF capital markets or trading space are super competitive by nature. I played soccer growing up and was goalkeeper on my field hockey team in college at a Division I school. Field hockey was new to me in college, but the field structure is very similar to soccer. I ended up excelling at it, received a scholarship, and was named Big Ten Defensive Player of the Week a few times. That was a big accomplishment for someone who had never played. Now I’m an equestrian, and I do competitive dressage riding. I’ve always been competitive, and that spills over into my career.

All the positions I have held have supported an ETF business in different ways. I started in client service, progressed to global equity and options execution trading, and then moved to ETF capital markets. From there, I went to index equity portfolio management where I spent a good part of my career managing ETFs, mutual funds, and institutional accounts. I also spent a few years at an ETF start-up company where a lot of my experience came together to help launch and manage that platform. Now at Allspring, I oversee execution of the firm’s ETF capital markets and strategy.

Q: Why have ETFs become so popular with individual and institutional investors?

A: What comes to mind for most investors is the transparency, tax efficiency, flexibility, and cost savings that ETFs can offer. First, the majority of ETFs are transparent. Both institutional and retail investors can know exactly what they’re invested in on a daily basis versus the less frequent mutual fund updates. This gives them the ability to make more informed and timely investment decisions. Second, the in-kind mechanism and the on-exchange trading for ETFs provides the ability to decrease or even eliminate capital gains distributions altogether, thus reducing their overall tax impact to a client’s portfolio.

From a flexibility standpoint, ETFs can support different investor types and investment processes. A retail investor can buy and hold an ETF over the long term, similar to a mutual fund. But, because ETFs can be traded intraday, investors can also choose the time of day and price they want to trade at versus a mutual fund where the only option is to trade at 4 p.m. NAV (net asset value). A more tactical investor might use ETFs to express an opinion on the current market environment or hedge exposures in their portfolio. Even ETF market makers and professional trading desks are using ETFs to hedge positions on their books. ETFs also cover a wide variety of investment strategies. Along with U.S. and international equity and fixed income, there are inverse and leveraged strategies, currencies, thematics, buffered ETFs, crypto, commodities, and even private credit and private equity ETFs.

In terms of fees, ETFs typically have lower management fees because of the operational and administrative efficiencies. The unique mechanics of an ETF often shield investors from internal portfolio transaction costs. ETFs are generally flexible, transparent, tax-efficient, and cost-effective—characteristics that investors often look for in an investment product.

What comes to mind for most investors is the transparency, tax efficiency, flexibility, and cost savings that ETFs can offer.

Q: How are actively managed ETFs reshaping the investment industry?

A: The potential cost and tax benefits of ETFs have helped drive increased active ETF launches and significant asset inflows. For those investments that previously weren’t available for certain investor types or only available in mutual fund wrappers, the ETF versions may offer a more attractive option.

For years, when it was just index funds in the ETF space, we wondered how long it would take for active funds to get on board. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) passed the ETF rule in 2019, and that’s made it easier and more cost effective for managers to create new funds. Now suddenly you have an influx of active ETFs launching. Just about any mutual fund strategy could be an ETF as well, giving investors the choice of what and how they want to invest.

Allspring takes a client-driven and product-agnostic approach to delivering our strategies in different ways. Our goal is to offer clients greater choice, whether that’s an active ETF, mutual fund, institutional separate account, or separately managed account.

Q: What do you think the future holds for ETFs?

A: ETF share classes are a new and exciting innovation for the industry.

They add an additional class to a mutual fund, allowing both the ETF and mutual fund share classes to coexist, giving investors different ways to invest in a single, pooled portfolio of assets. So, just as there are institutional shares and retail shares for mutual funds, you can now access the strategy through an ETF class. By adding an ETF share class, the shared portfolio gains access to the ETF’s creation and redemption process.* That means securities can be exchanged in-kind, which may help reduce the realization of capital gains inside the portfolio. While mutual funds technically have the ability to transact on an in-kind basis, they do so less frequently due to structural and operational limitations. However, when a mutual fund offers an ETF share class, the entire portfolio gains access to the ETF structure’s scalable, tax‑efficient in-kind mechanism. What this ultimately means for investors is that all shareholders across the different share classes can benefit from the enhanced tax efficiency of the ETF.

We received exemptive relief from the SEC in January 2026, which allows us to add ETF share classes to our existing mutual fund lineup. We’ve been working closely with key stakeholders to identify which mutual funds are the most appropriate candidates for this structure. Ultimately, when we offer mutual funds with ETF share classes, advisors and investors will be able to access some of our more popular, established investment strategies—with the added option of choosing between a mutual fund or an ETF structure. We’re excited about the opportunity to deliver our expansive investment capabilities in this new share class structure.

ETF share classes are a new and exciting innovation for the industry.

Q: Allspring now manages several active ETFs with more on the way—why did you start with these strategies in particular?

A: Just like with our other funds, it’s a collaborative decision between the distribution, investments, product development, and leadership teams. We assess many factors, such as client demand, performance history, fees, Allspring’s core competencies, and the competitive landscape. For our initial funds, we focused on core fixed income and core U.S. equity strategies—foundational building blocks of client and model portfolios. More recently, we've expanded into the SMID-cap space in equities and ultra-short municipals in fixed income. A lot of input and collaboration goes into our product pipeline and the decision of what to launch and when, and this is just the beginning of our ETF journey.