Closing of the fund isn’t terribly surprising, Strategas says
ZGEN launched at end of 2021, has held Duolingo, Tesla, others
An exchange-traded fund tracking US companies that adhere to the values of Generation Z is shuttering hardly more than a year after its launch.
The Generation Z ETF (ticker ZGEN), which launched at the end of 2021 and counts companies like Duolingo Inc. and Tesla Inc. among its top holdings, will cease trading and be closed for purchases at the end of the session on March 17. Behind its launch were Julian Feder and Eitan Prins-Trachtenberg, both teenagers at the time of the fund’s inception.
Its sub-adviser, Alkali Fintech LLC, cited the “macroeconomic climate” and sluggish market among reasons for their decision to close fund, according to a Friday release. The ETF has fallen 26% over the past year through Thursday, and has seen minimal inflows during its lifetime.
“Thematic funds — especially those focused on niche corners that are overweight tech — have faced a challenging environment over the last year as rates have skyrocketed,” said Todd Sohn, ETF strategist at Strategas Securities. “Many of the companies were born during the QE era and performance is reflecting this. Drop that into the ultra-competitive ETF environment, and the closing of the fund isn’t terribly surprising.”
ZGEN assigned firms a Gen-Z score based how much people part of that age group — those born after Jan. 1, 1997 — use a company and how much a company targets them. It also took into account how much a firm’s mission relates to “the core values of Gen Z,” among other factors listed on its website.
But the fund never caught on with investors. Its last inflow happened in June of last year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. As of Thursday, its assets totaled just $1.3 million.
“After careful consideration of a number of factors, including the negative macroeconomic climate that has significantly affected the underlying constituents and the ability to deliver on the ETF mandate, the Board concluded that it is advisable and in the best interest of the Fund and its shareholders to liquidate the Fund,” according to the release.
Then-second son Hunter Biden coached then-Vice President Joe Biden’s press secretary on how to respond to media questions about him joining the board of Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma Holdings, emails reviewed by The Post show.
The May 13, 2014, exchanges between Hunter and Kendra Barkoff, which have not been previously reported, form the basis of a complaint sent to the Justice Department on Friday alleging that the Biden scion, now 53, violated federal law by failing to register as a foreign agent.
“In advising the Office of the Vice President how to respond to press inquiries about his appointment, Hunter Biden ‘represent[ed] the interests of [a] foreign principal before any agency or official of the Government of the United States,'” America First Legal Foundation general counsel Gene Hamilton wrote to the assistant attorney general for national security, Matthew Olsen, quoting the relevant statute.
Burisma announced Hunter Biden’s appointment to its board of directors on May 12, 2014. The following day, according to the complaint, Barkoff sent Hunter an email saying: “Thanks for talking to me. [L]et me know who I should refer folks to.”
Hunter Biden coached then-Vice President Joe Biden’s press secretary on how to respond to media questions about him joining the board of a Ukrainian natural gas firm, Burisma, according to emails.WireImage
“What exactly are they asking?” Hunter responded. “For the time being I’d just refer them to my office. FYI I joined the board of Burisma Holdings Ltd. (Burisma.com) an independent/private natural gas producer in Ukraine along with the former president of Poland. I think the press release is on their website.”
Barkoff then forwarded Hunter an email from Max Seddon, then a foreign correspondent at BuzzFeed News.
“Russian state media is loving this press release, supposedly from a Cypriot-held Ukrainian natural gas company, claiming that the Vice President’s son has joined its board of directors,” Seddon wrote, addressing then-National Security Council spokesperson Laura Lucas Magnuson, who had forwarded it to Barkoff.
“Hunter Biden ‘represent[ed] the interests of [a] foreign principal before any agency or official of the Government of the United States,'” America First Legal Foundation general counsel Gene Hamilton (right) wrote.American First Legal
“The news seems rather odd on its face and, if true, would present a fairly glaring conflict of interest given the VP’s role on Ukraine policy – particularly since the company is controlled by Nikolai Zlochevsky, who was energy minister and deputy NSC chief under [former pro-Moscow Ukrainian President Viktor] Yanukovych,” the reporter added. “Is this true? What exactly is going on here?”
“Interesting,” Hunter wrote back. “Burisma is completely independent of the Ukrainian government with an independent board of directors. [Zlochevsky] served as Minister of Ecology and resigned in 2010. I joined the board as legal adviser and Burisma also engaged the law firm I am of counsel to Boies Schiller Flexner on matters pertaining to corporate governance, transparency, and expansion. Alana Apter former head of Morgan Stanley Europe is chairman of the board.”
In addition to forwarding Seddon’s questions, Barkoff told Hunter: “Let me know who in your office” to refer media to.
“Eric‐ he’s cc’d here,” Hunter answered, referring to one of his business partners, Eric Schwerin — who chimed in: “Kendra, I am around the next few days if you need me.”
“If anything beyond referring questions to my office is required from you or counsel you can contact Heather King at Boise Schiller,” Hunter directed Barkoff, who later sent him the statement her office was putting out to the press.
“Hunter Biden is a private citizen and a lawyer,” read the statement, which apparently met with Hunter’s approval. “The Vice President does not endorse any particular company and has no involvement with this company. For any additional questions, I refer you to Hunter’s office.”
The AFL complaint also noted that Hunter wrote Barkoff on June 26 to tell her: “I am really sorry but I have to cancel call today” — suggesting, according to the organization, that he “had ongoing discussions about the matter with the Office of Vice President that continued for nearly a month and a half.”
The America First Legal Foundation, founded by Stephen Miller, a former senior adviser to President Donald Trump, claimed the discussions with Barkoff showed “Hunter Biden is Burisma’s agent and subject to FARA registration because he was an officer of Burisma and represented Burisma’s interests to the Office of the Vice President in addition to advising on a public relations matter.”
Burisma announced Hunter Biden’s appointment to its board of directors on May 12, 2014.CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images
Attorneys for Hunter Biden and spokespeople for the Justice Department did not immediately respond to The Post’s requests for comment.
FARA refers to the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938, which requires individuals or companies lobbying on behalf of foreign governments, organizations or nationals to register with the Justice Department and state their activities, compensation, and relationship to the overseas concern.
Burisma hired Hunter Biden to serve as a board member in 2014 when his vice president father was leading the Obama administration’s Ukraine policy and paid him up to $1 million per year, despite no relevant energy industry experience.
“Leftist prosecutors gave Paul Manafort the functional equivalent of a life sentence for providing real counsel to the Ukrainian government based on decades of experience as a top political adviser,” Miller told The Post. “Hunter Biden was acting as a foreign agent, peddling his family name, with no legitimate experience whatsoever, and yet DOJ apparently couldn’t care less.
“Corruption piled on top of corruption,” he added. “The documents we obtained from the National Archives make clear that Hunter violated the Foreign Agents Registration Act and therefore must be held fully accountable under the law. America First Legal has filed a formal FARA complaint with DOJ to initiate that process. It is also essential that DOJ investigate Joe Biden’s collusive scheme with his son and the pay-for-play scandals that have enriched the Biden family.”
Miller’s group has had prior success with targeted complaints. For example, in October the Office of Special Counsel determined that White House chief of staff Ron Klain violated the Hatch Act with a political retweet from his official account, for which Klain received a warning.
Emails from Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop and witness observations indicate that Joe Biden as sitting vice president attended a 2015 dinner at DC’s Cafe Milano with Burisma executive Vadym Pozharskyi and Hunter’s other Russian and Kazakhstani business associates.
Former Trump senior adviser Stephen Miller claimed that “Hunter Biden is Burisma’s agent and subject to FARA registration because he was an officer of Burisma.”Bloomberg via Getty Images
Pozharskyi emailed Hunter the next day to thank him for “giving an opportunity to meet your father” — forming the basis of The Post’s first October 2020 bombshell from Hunter Biden’s laptop. Joe Biden called the report a false “Russian plan” at the time and social media platforms Twitter and Facebook initially censored it.
According to the complaint by Miller’s group, “A ‘foreign principal’ under FARA includes a ‘corporation … organized under the laws of or having its principal place of business in a foreign country.'”
Attorneys for Hunter Biden and spokespeople for the Justice Department did not immediately respond to The Post’s requests for comment.Paul Morigi
“Until its dissolution on February 16, 2023, Burisma Holdings Limited was a limited company registered in Cyprus and principally doing business in Ukraine. At all times relevant, Burisma was thus a ‘foreign principal,'” the complaint says.
“Any person who willfully violates any provision of FARA or any regulation thereunder shall, upon conviction thereof, be punished by a fine of not more than $250,000 or by imprisonment for not more than five years.”
Hunter Biden reportedly is under investigation by the US Attorney’s Office in Delaware for possible tax fraud, illegal foreign lobbying, money laundering and lying about his drug use on a gun purchase form.
A new study found that state laws legalizing medicinal and adult-use cannabis play “a significant role” in veterans diagnosed as addicts by the Veterans Health Administration (VHA), particularly in older patients.
According to the study, published by JAMA Psychiatry, “the U.S. national increase in [cannabis use disorder or CUD] diagnoses regardless of state laws underscores a growing need in the VHA and elsewhere to screen for cannabis use and offer evidence-based treatments.”
Cannabis use disorder is “characterized by problematic use, clinically significant distress or impairment, symptoms including tolerance, withdrawal, and neglect of other activities, and psychosocial and health-related problems,” per the researchers.
Based on annual records for VHA patients from 2005 to 2019, public health researchers found that “CUD rates increased from 1.38% to 2.25% in states with no cannabis legalization, 1.38% to 2.54% in states that legalized medical use, and 1.39% to 2.56% in states that legalized recreational use” per the study.
Over that period, recreational marijuana "accounted for 9.8% of the total addiction increase among veterans in states that legalized it for that purpose, while medical marijuana accounted for 4.7% of the surge in states that let doctors prescribe it," reported the Washington Times.
Researchers emphasized the necessity to detect cannabis use and CUD and treat it when it is found to be present.
Vaccines that offer protection against both COVID-19 and influenza with a single shot will likely not be ready in time for this year, a top federal official said Wednesday. However, tweaks to update the current COVID vaccines and drugs are expected soon.
The Food and Drug Administration's top vaccines official, Dr. Peter Marks, had previously said in September that vaccines to cover both viruses could be deployed this year.
But at a webinar this week by the National Foundation for Infectious Disease, Marks acknowledged the effort had proved "too heavy a lift" for this fall, ending hopes of a combined option for the 2023 fall and winter respiratory illness season.
"I think that had to do with the fact that it was not so clear that annual vaccination against COVID-19 was likely to be necessary, until the past several months. But our goal is for the following season to have that available," Marks said.
Moderna, Pfizer and Novavax have all announced plans to pursue trials of standalone flu vaccines in addition to versions combined with their COVID-19 shots. Pfizer executives told investors in January they did not expect approval of their combination shot until 2025.
Health authorities had previously voiced optimism that a combo shot would boost uptake. Only 19.5% of adults have gotten an updated bivalent COVID-19 booster dose this past season, compared to nearly half who say they got a flu shot.
A combo shot could also simplify an increasingly complex annual vaccination schedule ahead of the expected rollout of new RSV vaccines — to protect against the respiratory syncytial virus — which may need to go into arms around the same time.
Regardless, Marks said the FDA is working on "a robust grouping of data" vetting the safety and effectiveness of administering separate shots for flu and COVID-19 on the same day.
The FDA has previously announced plans to formally study a potential rare safety issue that was flagged this past season with co-administering the COVID and flu shots in seniors.
"People were doing that this year, but we want to have people have even more data to make them feel confident that doing so is both safe and effective," said Marks.
Other updates to COVID immunizations
His remark comes as the FDA has been working on efforts to "consolidate" the COVID-19 vaccines, following a vote by the regulator's outside advisers earlier this year to simplify the myriad of doses and formulas used for primary series and booster shots.
"We would have the same vaccine strain composition for all spike based COVID-19 vaccines, which would hopefully allow one to have interchangeability," said Marks.
Time is running out for the switch. While boosters for most Americans used an updated bivalent recipe targeted to the BA.4 and BA.5 variants this past winter, primary series shots for unvaccinated people still relies on shots made from the original monovalent recipe. That is due to expire and is largely no longer being produced.
"We're looking at a matter of weeks to, at most, a month or two," said Marks.
Marks said the FDA is aiming to complete its consolidation of the COVID-19 vaccines long before a planned June meeting to decide on revising shots again for this fall and winter.
On Wednesday, the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response said that the looming switch to a commercial market for COVID-19 vaccines is also expected to "align" with this expected "strain change."
The FDA also expects updates soon that could allow for the return of monoclonal antibody drugs for COVID-19.
Patients with compromised immune systems, who did not get sufficient protection from vaccines and antiviral pills, had relied on the antibody infusions from AstraZeneca's Evusheld to guard against the virus.
But in January, the FDA announced it was effectively ending the drug's authorization over the growth of SARS-CoV-2 variants that could now evade its protection.
"There are successors to the monoclonals that are in the process of being updated so that they will get the next generation of variants. And I expect, again, we'll hear more about those in the coming few months," said Marks.
