For forty years the only way to own an Amana strategy was a mutual fund. That changed on June 24, 2026, when Saturna Capital listed the Amana Growth ETF (AMGR), the Amana Equity Income ETF (AMEI) and the Amana Developing World ETF (AMEM) on Nasdaq, each run by the same portfolio managers and under the same Islamic screens as the mutual funds they mirror. The practical difference is price and packaging. The ETFs charge the Institutional share class expense ratio (0.61%, 0.76% and 0.91%) with no $100,000 minimum and no 0.25% 12b-1 fee, but they are tiny (between $6 million and $8 million each on October 19, 2026), they trade at a spread, and the mutual funds still have a thirty-year track record the ETFs cannot show. This guide compares the two wrappers line by line so a reader of our Amana mutual funds review or our AMAGX review can decide whether to switch, add, or stay put.
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What launched on June 24, 2026, and what it maps to
Saturna announced in May 2026 that it would bring four actively managed halal ETFs to market: Growth, Equity Income, Developing World and a Sukuk ETF (AMSU). Three of the four listed on June 24, 2026 under Nasdaq trader alert ETP2026-101, with GTS Securities as the designated liquidity provider. The Sukuk ETF did not launch with them and was not trading on Saturna's ETF performance page as of October 19, 2026; the Amana Participation Fund (AMAPX) remains the only Amana sukuk vehicle, covered in our guide to investing in sukuk from the US. Each ETF is a new series of the same Amana Mutual Funds Trust rather than a share class of the existing fund, which matters for taxes and for track records: the ETFs started from zero on launch day and carry no performance history from the mutual funds.
| Strategy | ETF (ticker, launched June 24, 2026) | Mutual fund Investor class | Mutual fund Institutional class | ETF net assets, Oct 19, 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Growth (US large cap, growth tilt) | AMGR, 0.61% | AMAGX, 0.86% (0.25% 12b-1), $100 minimum | AMIGX, 0.61%, $100,000 minimum | $7.87 million, 31 holdings |
| Equity Income (dividend-paying stocks, US and foreign) | AMEI, 0.76% | AMANX, 0.99% (0.25% 12b-1), $100 minimum | AMINX, 0.75%, $100,000 minimum | $5.98 million, 32 holdings |
| Developing World (emerging markets) | AMEM, 0.91% | AMDWX, 1.20% (0.25% 12b-1), $100 minimum | AMIDX, 0.98%, $100,000 minimum | $6.09 million, 31 holdings |
| Sukuk / fixed income | AMSU announced May 2026, not launched | AMAPX (Participation Fund) | AMIPX | n/a |
Expense ratios in the table are from the ETF summary prospectuses dated June 24, 2026 and the mutual fund prospectus dated September 28, 2026, as published on Saturna's fund pages. The ETF net assets and holding counts are from the same pages on October 19, 2026. By comparison, the Amana Growth Fund alone held $2.95 billion in Investor shares and $3.69 billion in Institutional shares on Saturna's Growth Fund page the same day, and Fidelity's fund data put the fund's total net assets at $6.72 billion on September 30, 2026. The ETF is roughly one thousandth the size of the mutual fund it mirrors.
Fees: the ETF is the Institutional class without the $100,000 gate
The cleanest way to read the fee table is that Saturna priced each ETF at exactly, or almost exactly, the Institutional share class of the matching mutual fund. The AMGR summary prospectus shows a 0.61% management fee, 0.00% 12b-1 and 0.00% other expenses, for a 0.61% total, with a $62 cost on $10,000 over one year and $195 over three. The ETF's Statement of Additional Information explains why other expenses are zero: under a unitary fee arrangement the adviser pays all fund expenses out of its advisory fee except brokerage, acquired fund fees, taxes, litigation and any 12b-1 payments. The 12b-1 plan exists on paper, capped at 0.25%, but the trustees have not approved any payments under it. For AMIGX the 0.61% total is a 0.58% management fee plus 0.03% other expenses; for the Investor class AMAGX the same 0.58% fee plus 0.25% 12b-1 plus 0.03% other expenses comes to 0.86%.
That 0.25% 12b-1 fee is the whole cost difference for a retail investor who could not reach the $100,000 Institutional minimum before. On a $25,000 holding it is $62.50 a year; on $100,000 it is $250 a year, or roughly $625 to $2,500 over ten years at a flat balance. The Equity Income pairing is almost the same story (AMEI 0.76% against AMANX 0.99% and AMINX 0.75%), and the Developing World pairing is the widest gap of the three (AMEM 0.91% against AMDWX 1.20% and AMIDX 0.98%), because the mutual fund's other expenses run at 0.15% to 0.18% while the ETF's unitary fee absorbs them. What the fee table does not show is the trading cost of the ETF, which the next section covers, and the platform cost of the mutual fund: Saturna's own $100 minimum ($0 in tax-sheltered accounts) does not apply everywhere, and Fidelity, for example, lists a $2,500 minimum for AMAGX on its platform.
Trading, spreads and the small-fund problem
The SEC's Investor Bulletin on mutual funds and ETFs (April 29, 2025) sets out the mechanical difference. A mutual fund investor buys and sells at the end-of-day net asset value, directly from the fund or through a broker, and does not know the exact price until the market closes. An ETF investor buys and sells on the exchange at the market price, which can be above or below NAV, and pays whatever bid-ask spread and commission the broker charges. For a $6 million ETF with one designated liquidity provider, those details are not theoretical. Saturna's own pages on October 19, 2026 reported the following.
- 30-day median bid-ask spreads of 0.27% for AMGR, 0.31% for AMEI and 0.32% for AMEM. A round trip costs the full spread, so a buy-and-sell of AMGR costs about as much as five months of the 12b-1 fee you avoided.
- Closing premiums and discounts to NAV were small on the day (AMGR at a 0.04% discount, AMEI at a 0.03% premium, AMEM at a 0.05% premium), but the quarterly summaries show the direction: AMEI closed at a premium on 59 of its 64 trading days in Q3 2026, and AMEM at a premium on 40 days and a discount on 22.
- Shares outstanding for AMGR were 310,000 at a $25.38 NAV. Creation units are 10,000 shares, so the fund's entire float is 31 creation units; a single large investor creating or redeeming moves the fund's size materially.
- Creation and redemption transaction fees charged to authorized participants are $300 (0.05%) for the Growth and Equity Income ETFs and $2,000 (0.50%) for the Developing World ETF, which is one reason emerging-market ETF spreads tend to be wider.
None of this makes the ETFs unsuitable, but it changes how to use them. Use limit orders rather than market orders, trade during US market hours when the underlying stocks are open (for AMEM, the Asian and European holdings are closed during most of the US session, which is why its premium swings are larger), and keep the holding period long enough that the spread is amortized. Our explainer on halal index funds versus halal ETFs covers the general trade-offs; the Amana ETFs sit at the illiquid end of that spectrum for now.
Taxes and distributions: the ETF advantage, with one Amana-specific caveat
The SEC bulletin's tax point is the usual argument for an ETF in a taxable account: because ETFs can redeem shares in kind by handing securities to authorized participants rather than selling them for cash, they typically distribute fewer capital gains than a mutual fund that must sell holdings to meet redemptions. The Amana Growth Fund is a textbook case: its page states that net capital gains are paid at the end of December and May, and its long-held technology positions (Apple, Taiwan Semiconductor, NVIDIA, ASML and Broadcom were the five largest holdings on September 30, 2026) carry large embedded gains that any selling realizes. Our piece on why halal investors often prefer ETFs for tax efficiency explains the mechanism in detail. As of October 19, 2026, none of the three ETFs had paid any distribution.
The caveat is in the ETFs' own risk disclosures. Under Cash Transactions Risk, the summary prospectus states that the fund may effect redemptions partly or wholly for cash rather than in kind, may therefore have to sell portfolio securities and recognize gains, and as a result may be less tax-efficient than an ETF that redeems principally in kind. That language is standard for actively managed ETFs with foreign holdings, and it is a reason not to assume the ETF will be perfectly gain-free. The SEC bulletin also makes the point that none of this matters inside a 401(k), IRA or HSA, where the ETF and the mutual fund are taxed identically. In a halal Roth IRA, the choice between AMGR and AMAGX is purely about fees, minimums and platform availability.
Shariah oversight: same screens, same certifier, one difference in cash
The screens are identical in substance. The AMGR circular and summary prospectus describe the same exclusions the mutual funds have used since 1986: no alcohol, tobacco, pork products, pornography, gambling, weapons, or interest-based banks, finance associations and insurers, and no investments that pay interest. The same board of religious advisers reviews both wrappers. Saturna's halal funds page states that the Amana Funds are reviewed quarterly by Amanie Advisors Sdn Bhd, and the ETFs received their first quarterly Shariah compliance certifications from Amanie's resident Shariah adviser, Dr. Shamsiah Mohamad, for the period April 1 to June 30, 2026 (letters dated August 10, 2026) and again for July 1 to September 30, 2026 (letters dated October 9, 2026, including this one for the Amana Growth ETF). The letters certify that the investment transactions for the period conformed to Shariah requirements as approved by the adviser; they do not publish a purification ratio, so investors who purify dividends must still do so from the fund's own reports.
The one structural difference is how cash is handled. The ETF SAI states that the funds cannot invest in interest-paying instruments for defensive purposes and that any cash holdings will be non-interest bearing, which is also why the AMGR summary prospectus warns that cash positions do not earn income. The Equity Income ETF alone may invest up to 20% of its total net assets in a wholly owned Cayman Islands subsidiary whose purpose is to gain exposure to Islamic income-producing investments, specifically murabaha and wakala, for its cash positions. That is the same technique the Amana Participation Fund uses for sukuk-adjacent instruments, and it means AMEI's idle cash can earn a Shariah-compliant return while AMGR's and AMEM's cannot. For zakat purposes nothing changes between wrappers; our guide to zakat on investments, including ETFs applies equally to both.
Which Amana wrapper for which account
| Situation | Better wrapper | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Taxable brokerage account, new money, long holding period | ETF (AMGR, AMEI, AMEM) | Institutional-level fee with no minimum, and no mandatory capital gains distributions so far; accept the spread as a one-time cost |
| Taxable account already holding AMAGX, AMANX or AMDWX with large gains | Keep the mutual fund | Selling to switch realizes the gain; the 0.25% 12b-1 saving rarely justifies the tax bill, and there is no tax-free share class conversion into the ETF |
| Roth or traditional IRA at a broker that charges no ETF commission | ETF | No tax difference inside the account, so the lower expense ratio wins; mutual fund platform minimums (for example $2,500 at Fidelity) do not apply |
| 401(k) or 403(b) plan menu | Whichever the plan offers | Most plan menus hold mutual funds only; AMAGX or AMIGX on the menu beats an ETF you cannot buy |
| Automatic monthly investing of small amounts | Mutual fund (Investor class) | Dollar-based purchases at NAV with a $100 minimum ($0 in tax-sheltered accounts at Saturna); ETF fractional-share support varies by broker |
| Holding above $100,000 in one strategy | Institutional class or ETF | Same expense ratio either way; the mutual fund avoids spreads and premiums, the ETF avoids forced distributions |
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Two things are missing from this table because they do not yet exist: a tax-free conversion path from the mutual fund share classes into the ETFs (the ETFs are separate series, so a taxable holder who wants to switch must sell and buy), and an Amana sukuk ETF. An investor who wants the income sleeve of a halal portfolio in ETF form still has to look at SP Funds' SPSK, as our halal dividend ETF guide explains, or hold AMAPX as a mutual fund.
How the strategies have actually performed
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The ETFs are too young to judge. Saturna's ETF performance page showed AMGR at +0.27% on NAV for the three months to September 30, 2026, AMEI at -2.24% and AMEM at -1.20%, against +2.32% for the Bloomberg US Large Cap index and -2.03% for the Bloomberg Emerging Markets index. Three months of data from a fund that was still being seeded is noise. The mutual funds are the record that matters: as of September 30, 2026, AMAGX had returned 18.49% over one year, 21.33% a year over three and 17.17% a year over ten; AMANX 15.56%, 16.34% and 11.77%; and AMDWX 27.62%, 18.18% and 7.34%, all net of Investor class fees. The Institutional classes, and by extension the ETFs, would have done about 0.25% a year better before trading costs. Our SPUS vs Amana Funds comparison puts those numbers against the index-tracking halal ETFs; the ETF wrapper does not change the concentrated, growth-tilted, quality-screened character of the strategies.
Our view
The Amana ETFs are the right product launched a little early. For a new investor with a taxable account or an IRA at a commission-free broker, AMGR, AMEI and AMEM are now the cheapest way to own Saturna's halal strategies: the Institutional fee with no minimum, no 12b-1 charge, and a wrapper that should distribute fewer gains over time. For an existing AMAGX, AMANX or AMDWX holder in a taxable account, the fee saving is 0.25% a year and the cost of switching is capital gains tax on a fund that has compounded at 17% a year for a decade; stay put unless you were going to sell anyway. For anyone, the $6 million to $8 million asset base and 0.27% to 0.32% spreads are the price of being first in, and they argue for limit orders and patience rather than for waiting. We would want to see assets above $50 million and a published purification ratio before calling the ETFs a complete replacement for the mutual funds, and we would want the Sukuk ETF to launch before calling the lineup complete. Until then, the halal ETF list and the Amana Funds provider page track fees and assets as they change. Facts checked against saturna.com, nasdaqtrader.com, investor.gov and fundresearch.fidelity.com on October 19 and 20, 2026.
Frequently asked questions
What are the Amana ETFs and when did they launch?
The Amana Growth ETF (AMGR), Amana Equity Income ETF (AMEI) and Amana Developing World ETF (AMEM) are actively managed, Shariah-compliant ETFs from Saturna Capital that began trading on Nasdaq on June 24, 2026. They mirror the Amana Growth, Income and Developing World mutual funds, with the same managers and screens. A fourth fund, the Amana Sukuk ETF (AMSU), was announced in May 2026 but had not launched as of October 2026.
Is AMGR cheaper than AMAGX?
Yes. AMGR's total expense ratio is 0.61%, the same as the Institutional class AMIGX, which normally requires $100,000. The Investor class AMAGX costs 0.86% because it adds a 0.25% 12b-1 distribution fee. The ETF has no minimum beyond one share (about $25 in October 2026), but you pay a bid-ask spread, which was 0.27% on a 30-day median basis, each time you trade.
Are the Amana ETFs halal and who certifies them?
They follow the same Islamic screens as the Amana mutual funds (no alcohol, tobacco, pork, pornography, gambling, weapons, interest-based finance or interest-paying investments) and are reviewed quarterly by Amanie Advisors Sdn Bhd. Amanie issued Shariah compliance certifications for each ETF covering April to June 2026 (dated August 10, 2026) and July to September 2026 (dated October 9, 2026).
Should I switch from Amana mutual funds to the ETFs?
In an IRA or other tax-sheltered account, switching costs nothing in tax and saves 0.25% a year if you hold the Investor class, so it is usually worth it once you account for the spread. In a taxable account, selling AMAGX, AMANX or AMDWX realizes capital gains, and there is no tax-free conversion into the ETFs. Most long-term holders should keep the mutual fund and direct new money to the ETF.
Are the Amana ETFs more tax-efficient than the mutual funds?
Probably, but not guaranteed. ETFs can redeem in kind and so typically distribute fewer capital gains, and none of the three had paid a distribution by October 2026. However, the summary prospectus warns that the funds may redeem for cash and sell securities, which can produce gains, especially for an active fund with foreign holdings like AMEM. Inside a 401(k), IRA or HSA the two wrappers are taxed the same.
Why are the Amana ETFs so small?
They are four months old. On October 19, 2026 AMGR held $7.87 million, AMEI $5.98 million and AMEM $6.09 million, against roughly $6.7 billion in the Amana Growth Fund alone. Small size means wider spreads (0.27% to 0.32%) and more frequent premiums to NAV. Assets should grow as brokers and advisers add the funds, but until then use limit orders and treat the spread as a one-time entry cost.
Sources
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- Nasdaq Trader, New ETP Listings alert ETP2026-101: Nasdaq to begin listing three Saturna ETFs on June 24, 2026 (June 23, 2026)
- Saturna Capital, Saturna Capital to Make ETF Debut with Four Actively Managed Halal Investment Strategies (May 6, 2026)
- Saturna Capital, Saturna Capital Enters ETF Marketplace, Launches Three ETFs (June 29, 2026)
- Saturna Capital, Amana Growth ETF summary prospectus (June 24, 2026)
- Saturna Capital, Amana ETFs Statement of Additional Information, revised September 30, 2026
- Saturna Capital, Amana Growth ETF product page, market data as of October 19, 2026
- Saturna Capital, Amana Equity Income ETF product page (checked October 19, 2026)
- Saturna Capital, Amana Developing World ETF product page (checked October 19, 2026)
- Saturna Capital, Amana Growth Fund fees and minimums, prospectus dated September 28, 2026
- Saturna Capital, Amana Income Fund fees and minimums, prospectus dated September 28, 2026
- Saturna Capital, Amana Developing World Fund fees and minimums, prospectus dated September 28, 2026
- Amanie Advisors, Shariah Compliance Certification for the Amana Growth ETF, Q3 2026 (October 9, 2026)
- Saturna Capital, Amana Funds: Halal Focus (quarterly review by Amanie Advisors)
- US Securities and Exchange Commission, Investor Bulletin: Characteristics of Mutual Funds and Exchange-Traded Funds (April 29, 2025)
- Fidelity Investments, AMAGX fund research page, net assets as of September 30, 2026
