# What is return of capital in an ETF distribution?

> Return of capital is the part of a distribution that is not income or realized gains, so it comes back out of the fund's own assets.

Data as of Oct 21, 2026. Rebuilt every trading night.

Answered from ETFIQ data as of Oct 21, 2026 .

## What is return of capital in an ETF distribution?

Return of capital is the part of a distribution that is not income or realized gains, so it comes back out of the fund's own assets and is not taxed as income in the year it is paid. It lowers the cost basis instead.

Issuers estimate the split on a Rule 19a-1 notice with each distribution, and the estimate is not final until the tax year closes. ETFIQ shows the issuer's own figure, never a computed one.

A high return of capital figure is not automatically a warning. A fund that writes options can pay cash labeled return of capital while its total return is healthy. What matters is whether the fund earned what it paid. The price change beside the cash shows that.

So ETFIQ always shows return of capital beside the price change over the same period.

### On ETFIQ today

| Ticker | Fund | Cash paid 1Y | Price 1Y | Total return 1Y | Return of capital, latest |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| MRNY | YieldMax MRNA Option Income Strategy ETF | 104.4% | +170.8% | +535.6% | not published |
| WNTR | YieldMax MSTR Short Option Income Strategy ETF | 83.4% | −50.7% | +13.1% | not published |
| AMDW | Roundhill AMD WeeklyPay ETF | 73.5% | +29.8% | +149.8% | not published |
| FIAT | YieldMax Short COIN Option Income Strategy ETF | 72.1% | −37.6% | +34.4% | not published |
| AMDY | YieldMax AMD Option Income Strategy ETF | 68.9% | −9.0% | +91.9% | not published |
| AMYY | GraniteShares YieldBOOST AMD ETF | 60.7% | −50.6% | +16.8% | not published |
| CVNY | YieldMax CVNA Option Income Strategy ETF | 53.7% | −55.1% | −7.1% | not published |
| TSYY | GraniteShares YieldBOOST TSLA ETF | 52.9% | −67.9% | −21.8% | not published |

### Where to next

### Where these figures came from

ETFIQ links to the documents behind every figure; a link is not an endorsement.

ETFIQ is an independent publisher and makes no recommendations. Standards and sources

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Source: ETFIQ, independent ETF data. Recomputed nightly from public filings and prices.
Cite: ETFIQ, What is return of capital in an ETF distribution?, data as of Oct 21, 2026. https://etfiq.com/questions/what-is-return-of-capital
Licence: https://etfiq.com/license/ Figures ETFIQ computes are free to use with attribution: ETFIQ (etfiq.com). Issuer data stays under its owner's terms.
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