Over the year to October 21, 2026, ETFIQ tracked 67 alternatives ETFs through 52 weekly closes, 25 of which were down weeks for the S&P 500, with the index falling an average of 1.14% in those weeks. Sixteen of the 67 funds rose, on average, during those same weeks, and across the group the median fund's down-week return came to 37% of the index's decline. That number, down-week capture, measures a fund's own average return in the S&P 500's down weeks as a share of the index's average fall in those weeks; a negative number means the fund rose while the index fell.
The strategies behaved differently from one another, which is why the data is grouped that way. Volatility funds had the strongest showing against falling stocks: 5 of 9 rose when the index fell, and the group's median correlation to the S&P 500 was −0.66, with a median down-week capture of −43.5%. Market neutral funds, just two in the set, both rose when the index fell, with a median capture of −103.3%. Hedged equity, the largest group at 21 funds, moved much more closely with the market: median correlation of +0.91 and median down-week capture of 60.5%, with only 4 of 21 funds rising in down weeks. Managed futures funds, 17 in total, had a lower median correlation of +0.46 and a median capture of 36.5%, with 3 of 17 rising. Long-short equity funds, 8 in the set, had none rise during down weeks, with a median capture of 59.0%. Multi-strategy, event driven and the single global macro fund sat at various points in between, as the table shows.
Individual funds within a strategy did not all move alike. Among volatility funds, UVXY rose an average of 2.98% in down weeks, a capture of −261.7%, while SVXY, built to move opposite the VIX, fell 1.18% in those same weeks, a capture of 103.5%. In market neutral, BTAL rose 1.89% in down weeks (capture −166.3%) while MKTN rose a smaller 0.46% (capture −40.3%). In managed futures, CTA rose 0.36% in down weeks while RSST fell 1.74%, a capture of 153.0%. In hedged equity, QBER's average down-week return was +0.17% against XTR's −1.12%, spanning the strategy's wide range.
Rising in down weeks did not always mean beating cash. Of the 67 funds, 50 finished ahead of T-bills over the full 52 weeks, but among the 16 funds that rose when the index fell, only 6 also cleared that bar. UVXY, VXX, VIXY, VIXM, VXZ and BTAL, each a fund that rose during market declines, finished behind T-bills over the year by margins ranging from 19.8 to 72.5 percentage points. Managed futures funds, despite lower down-week sensitivity, mostly finished ahead of T-bills, with 16 of 17 doing so.
Readers can check any fund's own correlation, down-week capture and performance against T-bills, along with its strategy classification, on its page at ETFIQ.