Range Nuclear Renaissance Index ETF
Range Funds (Exchange Traded Concepts Trust)
Tracks the VettaFi Nuclear Renaissance Index — a global pure-play nuclear basket across utilities/operators, reactor and SMR developers, uranium miners, and nuclear construction/services.
Top holdings
Largest uranium miner; biggest single position
Korean nuclear construction / EPC
Reactor tech + grid/power equipment
Nuclear-heavy IPP signing datacenter PPAs
SMR developer
IPP with a nuclear fleet
Recent moves
Rode the 2025-26 nuclear supercycle on AI-datacenter demand, hyperscaler PPAs, and uranium tightness, but has given back ground in 2026 (slightly negative YTD) after the explosive 2024-25 run.
Our take
The most balanced pure-nuclear basket — it spreads across operators, SMR developers, miners, and construction rather than leaning on one sleeve, making it the 'own the whole renaissance' option; the short track record and cooling 1y are the honest caveats.
The 'own the whole renaissance' framing oversells the balance: at ~39% in the top 10, the book is led by nuclear utilities/operators (Dominion, Talen, Endesa, CEZ, PG&E, Duke) plus one miner (Cameco ~8%) and two equipment names (GE Vernova, Rolls-Royce).
It is really a nuclear-utility basket with a mining/SMR tail, not four equal sleeves — so it inherits utility rate-sensitivity more than the marketing implies. Crucially, every sleeve shares one macro driver (AI-power-demand + uranium tightness), so the intra-theme 'diversification' collapses in a drawdown: operators, miners, and SMR story-stocks de-rate together. The record is one regime — the entire since-inception gain is the 2024-25 re-rating; it has never traded through a nuclear down-cycle.
- 2026-07The single-regime record no longer holds: after six months of de-rating from a mid-March +15.69% YTD, NUKZ closed 31 Jul 2026 at $63.68, -17.7% off its $77.34 52-week high.
Thesis
NUKZ is a market-cap-weighted global nuclear-value-chain index fund (~53 names) betting that AI-datacenter power demand structurally re-rates the entire nuclear complex — operators, SMR developers, uranium, and construction — in one ticker.
Track the VettaFi Nuclear Renaissance Index: cap-weight global pure-play nuclear across reactor operators/utilities, SMR & reactor OEMs, uranium miners, and nuclear construction/services. No leverage, no active bets — a passive thematic basket rebalanced to the index.
Assessment
- Broader than a pure uranium-miner play: one ticker spans operators, OEMs, miners and services, so it isn't hostage to the uranium spot price alone
- Genuine SMR/next-gen optionality (GE Vernova, Rolls-Royce, Samsung C&T) that uranium-only funds lack
- Cap-weighting keeps any single name modest (top holding Cameco ~8%), lower single-stock risk than URA's ~25% Cameco
- Rides a real structural catalyst — hyperscaler PPAs and datacenter baseload demand, not just a commodity cycle
- 0.85% expense ratio is high for a passive single-theme index fund — above URA (~0.69%) and NLR (~0.61%)
- 'Balanced across the fuel cycle' understates a heavy utilities/operators tilt at the top of the book
- Since-inception (Jan 2024) record spans only a bull regime — no observed nuclear/uranium drawdown
- Foreign names (Endesa, CEZ, Samsung C&T, Rolls-Royce) add FX and non-US policy/regulatory exposure most buyers don't price
Record
Two windows tell one story: issuer 1yr NAV +21.84% and since-inception +51.27% cumulative (issuer NAV, as of Jun 30 2026); stockanalysis 1yr +5.48% (as of Jul 21 2026). The gap is the rolling window, not a data error — the explosive 2024-25 re-rating sits inside the Jun-30 lookback but rolls off by late July, so the trailing-1yr figure is collapsing (~+73% back in Apr, approx) as a roughly flat 2026 replaces it in the window. That decay is the point: the headline return is a single-regime artifact — a uranium-spot spike above $100/lb, SMR hype, and datacenter-PPA announcements — not a repeatable earnings engine. AUM ~$764M, 53 holdings (Jul 2026). This is a plain index ETF, so there is no daily-reset/leverage decay; the risk is ordinary sector concentration, not compounding drag.
- 2026-07Assets stand at $777.9M as of 31 Jul 2026, below the ~$837M the issuer and secondary sites still carry on a 30 Jun 2026 vintage.
Risks & fit
- Single-theme concentration: all sleeves de-rate together if the AI-power narrative cracks — intra-basket diversification is illusory
- SMR/next-gen names are largely pre-revenue story stocks; a sentiment reversal hits them hardest
- Uranium spot is cyclical (boom-bust); a roll-over drags the miner sleeve regardless of reactor demand
- Utility sleeve is rate-sensitive — ~4% Treasury yields cap the operator names' upside
- Crowded, fast-money thematic trade with a ~2.5-yr history and no full-cycle test
The thesis breaks if AI-datacenter power-demand forecasts are cut, hyperscaler nuclear PPAs stall, or SMR commercialization timelines slip — while uranium spot rolls over. Any one weakens a sleeve; together they de-rate the whole basket at once, and the cap-weighted spread across 53 names provides no shelter because they share the single catalyst. A flat-to-down 2026 despite continued datacenter capex headlines would be the early tell.
Someone who wants one-ticker, diversified exposure to the nuclear-renaissance theme — broader than a uranium-miner fund, with SMR optionality — and can tolerate single-theme, single-regime volatility as a satellite sleeve, not a core holding. Buyers wanting pure uranium torque or a lower fee should look at the miner-focused peers.
Net expense ratio 0.85% (stockanalysis, as of Jul 2026) — high for a passive thematic index fund; higher than URA (~0.69%) and NLR (~0.61%).