{"url":"https://etfiq.com/questions/what-happens-if-you-hold-a-leveraged-etf","section":"questions","title":"What happens if you hold a leveraged ETF for a year? | ETFIQ","description":"Over one year to Oct 20, 2026, 206 of 290 leveraged and inverse ETFs finished short of what their own stated multiple implied over exactly the same days.","as_of":"Oct 20, 2026","structured_data":[{"@type":"FAQPage","mainEntity":[{"@type":"Question","name":"What happens if you hold a leveraged ETF for a year?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"Over one year to Oct 20, 2026, 206 of 290 leveraged and inverse ETFs finished short of what their own stated multiple implied over exactly the same days. The multiple erodes, and how far depends on how much the underlying moved about rather than where it ended up: each window below compares what the funds returned against what their own stated multiple would have produced over those days."}}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"ETFIQ","item":"https://etfiq.com/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Questions","item":"https://etfiq.com/questions/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"What happens if you hold a leveraged ETF for a year?","item":"https://etfiq.com/questions/what-happens-if-you-hold-a-leveraged-etf"}]},{"@type":"WebPage","name":"What happens if you hold a leveraged ETF for a year?","description":"Over one year to Oct 20, 2026, 206 of 290 leveraged and inverse ETFs finished short of what their own stated multiple implied over exactly the same days.","url":"https://etfiq.com/questions/what-happens-if-you-hold-a-leveraged-etf","dateModified":"2026-10-20","isPartOf":{"@type":"WebSite","name":"ETFIQ","url":"https://etfiq.com"},"speakable":{"@type":"SpeakableSpecification","cssSelector":[".lede"]},"publisher":{"@id":"https://etfiq.com/#org"}}],"characters":2690,"truncated":false,"content":"ETFIQ / Questions / What happens if you hold a leveraged ETF for a year? \n \n Answered from ETFIQ data as of Oct 20, 2026 .\n What happens if you hold a leveraged ETF for a year?\n Over one year to Oct 20, 2026, 206 of 290 leveraged and inverse ETFs finished short of what their own stated multiple implied over exactly the same days. The multiple erodes, and how far depends on how much the underlying moved about rather than where it ended up: each window below compares what the funds returned against what their own stated multiple would have produced over those days.\n The gap is not a fee and it is not tracking error in the usual sense. It is what compounding does to a levered daily return along a path. It grows with the length of the hold and with the volatility of what is levered.\n It does not always run against the holder. In a steady run in one direction, compounding a levered daily return produces more than the multiple times the period move. That is why the table has funds on both sides.\n ETFIQ takes no view on how long to hold anything. The figures below are what happened, over several windows.\n On ETFIQ today\n Held for Funds measured Fell short Median difference Median underlying volatility \n One month 656 403 of 656 \u22121.0 pts 40% \n Three months 656 504 of 656 \u22124.5 pts 48% \n Six months 427 327 of 427 \u22127.5 pts 46% \n One year 290 206 of 290 \u221211.6 pts 37% \n Three years 94 63 of 94 \u221225.8 pts 21% \n \n Where to next\n Where these figures came from\n The multiple each fund states in its own registered name, from the SEC investment company series and class file SEC EDGAR, full-text search of fund filings SEC Form N-PORT, what a fund filed it holds Rule 19a-1, what a distribution notice must say ETFIQ links to the documents behind every figure; a link is not an endorsement.\n ETFIQ is an independent publisher and makes no recommendations. Standards and sources \n Cite this page. ETFIQ, What happens if you hold a leveraged ETF for a year?, data as of Oct 20, 2026. https://etfiq.com/questions/what-happens-if-you-hold-a-leveraged-etf Free to use with attribution for figures ETFIQ computes; issuer data stays under its owner's terms. The underlying files are at Open data .\n Other forms Plain ETFIQ, What happens if you hold a leveraged ETF for a year?, data as of Oct 20, 2026. https://etfiq.com/questions/what-happens-if-you-hold-a-leveraged-etf APA ETFIQ. (Oct 20, 2026). What happens if you hold a leveraged ETF for a year?. Retrieved from https://etfiq.com/questions/what-happens-if-you-hold-a-leveraged-etf Markdown [What happens if you hold a leveraged ETF for a year? (ETFIQ, Oct 20, 2026)](https://etfiq.com/questions/what-happens-if-you-hold-a-leveraged-etf)","source":"ETFIQ, independent ETF data. Recomputed nightly from public filings and prices.","publisher":{"@id":"https://etfiq.com/#org","name":"ETFIQ","url":"https://etfiq.com"},"license":"https://etfiq.com/license/","license_text":"Figures ETFIQ computes are free to use with attribution: ETFIQ (etfiq.com). Issuer data stays under its owner's terms.","citation":"ETFIQ, What happens if you hold a leveraged ETF for a year?, data as of Oct 20, 2026. https://etfiq.com/questions/what-happens-if-you-hold-a-leveraged-etf"}