First Trust Industrials/Producer Durables AlphaDEX Fund

First Trust Industrials/Producer Durables AlphaDEX Fund (FXR) is an ETF that tracks the StrataQuant Industrials Index. The index picks industrials stocks from the Russell 1000 by growth and value scores and weights them in tiers, not by company size. That spreads money across about 156 stocks. It also costs 0.60% a year, against 0.08% for the Industrial Select Sector SPDR Fund (XLI), and the fund trades heavily, with 76% portfolio turnover.

• Over the year to Oct 27, 2026, FXR returned +6.6%, 4th of 5 among similar funds.
• Its 5-year annualized return was +8.1% and its 10-year +12.2%.
• In the 2020 COVID crash it fell 43.5% and regained its old high 7.6 months after the low.
• Its worst full calendar year was 2008 (-46.0%); its best was 2013 (+46.7%).
• The deepest fall in its price history was 63.8% (May 31, 2007 to Mar 9, 2009), recovered by Jan 2, 2013.

As of Jul 31, 2026, the fund held 156 securities; the ten largest made up 12.94% of assets.

• Over the three months to Jul 31, 2026, investors added a net $41.2M (creations minus redemptions, per the N-PORT report).
• Monthly total returns reported for that quarter: -0.64%, +4.61%, -3.08%.

FXR tries to match the StrataQuant Industrials Index, which is built by ICE Data Indices. The fund normally keeps at least 90% of its net assets in the stocks in that index. The index starts with the Russell 1000, which is roughly the 1,000 largest US companies, and drops stocks that fail its share-class and trading-volume tests. Each remaining stock gets a score based on growth measures, value measures or both. A stock that counts as both gets the better of its two scores.

Stocks in the industrials sector, as the index provider defines it, are then ranked by score. The index keeps the top 75% or 40 stocks, whichever is more. Those stocks are split into five equal groups (quintiles), and the higher-scoring groups get bigger weights. Company size does not set the weights, so the 10 largest positions were just 12.94% of assets as of July 31, 2026. The provider defines the sector broadly. The largest holdings included Accenture, PayPal, Genpact and Fidelity National Information Services next to firms like EMCOR Group.

The index is rebuilt and rebalanced every quarter, and the fund follows soon after. That produced 76% portfolio turnover, a rough measure of how much of the portfolio was replaced over a year, and heavy trading can add hidden costs. The fund held stocks directly and no derivatives as of July 31, 2026.

• FXR charges 0.6% a year, versus an average of 0.16% for the similar funds below (5th of 5, cheapest first).
• Of that, 0.5% is the management fee; the rest covers other fund expenses.

It is a single-sector fund with a high fee, very little income and declines as deep as 63.8%, so it fits better as a small add-on than as a foundation.

FXR could add industrials exposure tilted toward stocks that score well on growth and value, spread thinly across many companies. Its declines have been deep. It fell 62.7% in the 2008 financial crisis and lost 46% in calendar 2008. Its deepest drop, 63.8% from May 2007 to March 2009, did not fully recover until January 2013. It fell 43.5% in the 2020 COVID crash and recovered by November 2020. It fell 26.9% in 2022, deeper than the broad market's 23.4%, and recovered in December 2023. A retiree forced to sell in a slump like these could lock in large losses.

Income is small: a 0.78% trailing yield, paid quarterly, as of October 27, 2026. The 0.60% expense ratio compares with a 0.16% average for similar funds. Past results don't predict future ones, and a retirement plan should look at the whole portfolio, not one fund.

Matched by holdings overlap from the latest N-PORT reports.