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AvantisIT
Eduardo Repetto's Avantis Investors applies academic research to factor-based ETFs, crossing $5B in assets within three years of its 2019 launch.
AvantisIT
Avantis Investors was established in 2019 as a subsidiary of American Century Investments, founded by Eduardo Repetto alongside Phil McInnis and a core team of former Dimensional Fund Advisors executives. Repetto, who served as co-CEO and chief investment officer at Dimensional, brought with him a deep architecture of systematic investing rooted in the efficient-market hypothesis. The firm was built from the ground up to translate the same academic principles — emphasizing size, relative price, and profitability premiums — into a suite of low-cost, transparent exchange-traded funds and separately managed accounts. The firm deploys capital exclusively through liquid public equities and fixed income, structuring its portfolios to capture expected return premiums identified in peer-reviewed financial literature. Its strategy centers on a rules-based, multi-factor approach that overweights companies with low valuations and high profitability while maintaining broad diversification. Avantis manages a series of ETFs, including the Avantis U.S. Equity ETF, Avantis International Equity ETF, and Avantis U.S. Small Cap Value ETF. Fixed-income exposure is delivered through vehicles like the Avantis Core Fixed Income ETF, targeting investment-grade bonds with a similar systematic tilt. The portfolios span U.S. developed markets, international developed ex-U.S., and emerging markets, with a notable emphasis on small-cap value across geographic borders. As a systematic manager, Avantis has scaled rapidly through the American Century distribution network, reaching tens of billions in assets under management across its fund range since inception. The investment team operates from offices in Kansas City and New York, closely partnered with American Century's operational infrastructure but maintaining independent portfolio management. In December 2022, Avantis expanded its lineup with the launch of the Avantis All Equity Markets Value ETF, a fund-of-funds structure that allocated across its existing equity strategies. The firm has not publicly disclosed adjacent private or philanthropic vehicles, functioning purely as an investment strategy group within the broader American Century organization. The structural differentiator is Avantis's integration of a daily-rebalanced systematic process with an ETF wrapper, allowing its factor strategies to run at a fee level typically associated with passive market-cap indexing. Unlike traditional Dimensional-heritage managers that historically required advisor access, Avantis delivers its methodology in an open-architecture format that any investor can buy directly on an exchange. This architecture removes the traditional gatekeeping from systematic factor investing while preserving the professional portfolio management and academic oversight that define the approach.
General information
Firm type
Asset Manager
Year founded
2019
AUM
$5B - $10B USD (Altss estimate)
Location
Region
North America
Country
United States
City
New York
Corporate office
New York, NY, United States
Principals
Eduardo Repetto
Chief Investment Officer
Phil McInnis
Chief Executive Officer
Sector focus
Frequently asked questions
Who runs investment decisions at Avantis Investors?
Eduardo Repetto serves as chief investment officer and co-founder, directly overseeing portfolio design and strategy implementation. He spent 19 years at Dimensional Fund Advisors, rising to co-CEO and co-CIO, and holds a PhD in aeronautics from Caltech. The investment team operates with a consensus-driven, committee-based process rooted in the same empirical research architecture Repetto helped build at Dimensional.
How is Avantis related to American Century Investments?
Avantis Investors is a wholly owned subsidiary of American Century Investments, which incubates the firm and provides distribution, operations, and back-office support. American Century launched Avantis as a distinct brand in 2019, recruiting Eduardo Repetto and a senior team from Dimensional Fund Advisors to build the systematic ETF business. Avantis retains independent portfolio management authority while benefiting from the infrastructure of its parent.
Does Avantis participate in fund commitments or only direct securities?
Avantis operates exclusively in public markets through its own ETFs and separately managed accounts. It does not make fund commitments to external managers, invest in private markets, or run a fund-of-funds operation. All portfolio construction involves direct ownership of individual equities and fixed-income securities screened through Avantis's systematic factor models.
What investment stages does Avantis typically target?
Avantis targets the entire public equity market spectrum, from large-cap developed stocks to small-cap emerging-market companies, with a persistent tilt toward value and profitability factors. The firm does not operate in venture capital, growth equity, or any private investment stage. Its fixed-income strategies cover the full duration spectrum of investment-grade bonds, with systematic emphasis on credit and term premiums.
How does Avantis source its investment edge?
The investment edge is structural rather than information-based. Avantis applies multi-factor screens for relative price, profitability, and size in a daily-rebalanced systematic framework, seeking to capture the return premiums identified in academic literature without making discretionary stock calls. The process does not rely on proprietary deal flow or private market access — it is a replication strategy executed at scale with low fees.
Where does the underlying capital come from?
Avantis does not operate as a family office or manage a single pool of proprietary capital. Its assets come from individual investors, registered investment advisors, and institutional allocators who purchase Avantis ETFs on public exchanges or allocate through separately managed accounts on American Century's platform. There is no disclosed wealth-origin figure or founding-family capital backing the firm.
What is Avantis's known posture on co-investments?
Avantis does not participate in co-investments alongside external general partners or private fund managers because its strategy is limited to public-market securities held within its own pooled investment vehicles. The firm's systematic approach is fully implemented through its ETF and SMA offerings, with no sidecar vehicles, co-investment funds, or bespoke portfolio mandates disclosed to the public.
Profile maintained by Altss using OSINT (open-source intelligence), regulatory filings, licensed data partners, and verified direct submissions. Read the methodology. Last updated: . Continuous refresh with full update cycles at least every 30 days.
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