Nasdaq Just for Funds: DGRW

Published April 29, 2025

In this segment of Nasdaq’s Just for Funds, Head of Equity Strategy, Jeff Weniger joins Nasdaq host Danielle Rutsky to discuss the WisdomTree U.S. Quality Dividend Growth Fund, DGRW. Jeff covers how DGRW’s focus on quality fundamentals and long-term dividend growth potential makes it a compelling core equity holding in today’s market environment.

Danielle

Hi NASDAQ followers, I'm Danielle Rustky, ETF Lead Product Manager here at MarketSight in Times Square with Jeff Weniger, Head of Equity Strategy of WisdomTree. Thank you for being here.

Jeff Weniger:

My pleasure.

Danielle Rutsky:

Well, why should investors consider the WisdomTree U.S. Quality Dividend and Growth Fund in their portfolio?

Jeff Weniger:

Sure, and that fund has been around since May of 2013 at this point, so it's becoming one of our more seasoned funds. It's almost as new as some of the other ones that had been launched almost 20 years ago.

Danielle Rutsky:

Wow.

Jeff Weniger:

It's a 10-plus year track record. And it's been doing great. And one of the things about it is I think it's really starting to earn its claim to fame on downside capture, which in these markets in 2025 is starting to become much more relevant in conversations. And it's really earned its stripes through the years with the COVID crash, the 2022 bear, and so on.

Danielle Rutsky:

So with that history, what benefits does DGRW provide in the current landscape?

Jeff Weniger:

Well, I'd say you could use it as the blend fund for basically your entire US equity allocation because what it's done is it's held up throughout the years. And most of the time through those years, we used to call them the fangs. These days we call them the Mag-7. Most of that time it didn't own very much of those at all and still managed to keep up. And now I think it's becoming very relevant for right here, right now in that, well, the Mag-7 is generally weak and it's starting to really show in an ugly tape, in a market that wants to go sideways to down that it is kind of like the all seasons ETF.

Danielle Rutsky:

So with being an all seasons ETF, there are rebalances that happen. And it under one rebalance in December. can you tell us a little bit about any notable changes there?

Jeff Weniger:

Yeah, you have, well, one of the things that came up, I guess you could say, is Exxon and Chevron started to show up. They were passing the profitability screens, showing up in size, even inside the top 10 in that allocation. So the screens, which are return on equity, return on assets and future earnings growth, starting to identify the U.S. energy patch. And Broadcom, starting to fall out of that type of situation. So it's really liking staples, it's liking industrials, energy. Those are some of the sectors that are really recently popping up in that screen.

Danielle Rutsky:

What are the benefits of diversification in those screens for quality and growth screens?

Jeff Weniger:

Well, one of the things is with quality you can end up theoretically, we don't know what the future may hold, really protecting should the market end up looking to punish junkier names. I think that's the key with the quality screen. But when you do it with earnings growth, put dividends into the concept as well, what you can do is really create some sort of dividend growers type concept through the years. And I think that that's really the appeal of the mandate is that not so much what is the dividend yield now, but what could you get in cash flows in 2030 or 2035. That's part of the reason it has a ton of success since we launched it back in 2013.

Danielle Rutsky:

Yeah, that's amazing. Thank you so much. It was great to learn more.

Jeff Weniger:

Thank you.

Related resources

DGRW Fund page

Equity

Quality strategy page

Open resource

About the contributor

Jeff Weniger, CFA

Head of Equity Strategy

Jeff Weniger, CFA, has been with WisdomTree since 2017 and serves as the Head of Equities. He shapes the firm’s market outlook through a combination of macroeconomic and fundamental analysis. With more than two decades in investment strategy, Jeff is known for his work on market cycles and valuations. Before joining WisdomTree, Jeff was with BMO Private Bank and BMO Global Asset Management for 11 years. At BMO, he sat on the firm’s Asset Allocation Committee and co-managed ETF model portfolios across the U.S. and Canada. In 2013, at age 32, he became the youngest member of BMO’s Global Investment Forum. When he left BMO to come to WisdomTree, his final role was Director, Senior Strategist in the Office of the CIO in 2017.

Jeff is a frequent television guest on networks such as CNBC, Bloomberg, and Schwab, with regular print appearances in The Wall Street Journal, Barron’s and Reuters. He also appears weekly on the Behind the Markets podcast and is a regular on SiriusXM’s The Business Briefing. On X, Jeff has developed one of the larger followings in financial media. He earned a B.S. in Finance from the University of Florida and an MBA from the University of Notre Dame. He has held the CFA charter since 2006.

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