BUGG vs CLDD vs QETH: Ether Holds First, but the Two Software Funds Rejoin the Top Three
Updated: 21 hours ago
Written by Christopher Hall, AdvDipFP | Authorised Representative, AFSL 526688 | Updated October 2026
Data current as of 15 October 2026.
At 15 October 2026 the three ASX-listed ETFs at the top of the weekly ranking (where these three funds sit on the ASX ETF board) are the Betashares Ethereum ETF (QETH, +35.32% quarterly), the Global X Cybersecurity ETF (BUGG, +33.48%) and the Betashares Cloud Computing ETF (CLDD, +28.88%). Two of them are global software funds that hold three companies in common. The third holds no companies at all — it holds ether. BUGG and CLDD return to the top three from 8th and 7th place a week earlier, ending a three-week run in which no equity fund sat in the leading trio, and this is the same three funds that led on 28 August 2026, in a different order.
These three were selected by rule rather than by choice. Finer Market Points ranks every fund in its weekly ETF export that carries a usable quarterly return — 447 of 471 this week — and compares whichever three finish on top — so the trio changes when the board changes, and no fund is included because it was interesting. Every fund fact below comes from the issuer's own disclosure, Global X for BUGG as at 28 August 2026 and Betashares for CLDD and QETH as at 27 August 2026; company share prices come from dated closing-price tables. This comparison is published by an education provider rather than by any of the three fund issuers.
What Is Each ETF Built to Do?
BUGG tracks the Indxx Cybersecurity Index and holds more than 30 companies whose principal business is preventing intrusion and attack on systems, networks and devices. It is predominantly US pure-play cybersecurity software, with no large-cap technology ballast to dilute it.
CLDD tracks the Indxx Global Cloud Computing Index and holds 38 cloud infrastructure, platform and software-as-a-service businesses. One point of construction matters when reading any comparison involving it: the index holds cloud tenants, not cloud landlords — Microsoft, Amazon and Alphabet are absent by design, so a fund with heavy mega-cap cloud weights can have substantial cloud exposure that does not intersect CLDD's portfolio at all.
QETH is not an equity fund. It aims to track the price of ether in Australian dollars, and it does so by investing in the NYSE-listed Bitwise Ethereum ETF, whose underlying ether is held offline in cold storage by a global digital asset custodian. It holds one asset. Betashares states the fund "should be considered extremely high risk" and describes it as suitable only for informed investors with a very high risk tolerance seeking an allocation of 5% or less.
QETH | BUGG | CLDD | |
Provider | Betashares | Global X | Betashares |
Exposure | Ether (single asset) | Global pure-play cybersecurity | Global cloud & SaaS software |
Index | None — tracks the ether price in A$ | Indxx Cybersecurity Index | Indxx Global Cloud Computing Index |
Holdings | 1 asset, via one underlying fund | 30+ companies | 38 companies |
Management fee p.a. | 0.45% | 0.47% | 0.67% |
Fund size | A$31.2 million (27 Aug 2026) | $27+ million (27 Aug 2026) | A$49.8 million (27 Aug 2026) |
ASX inception | 18 February 2025 | 11 September 2023 | 22 February 2021 |
Currency hedged | No | No | No |
Distributions | None expected | Not stated on the fund page | Semi-annual |
Quarterly return to 15 Oct 2026 | +35.32% | +33.48% | +28.88% |
Weekly return | −1.65% | +15.74% | +7.62% |
Monthly return | +28.59% | +5.62% | +0.44% |
One-year return | −49.81% | +25.12% | +16.99% |
Read the last four rows together. The three funds are within 6.44 percentage points of each other on the quarter and nowhere near each other on the week, the month or the year: QETH has the best quarter and month and the worst year, while BUGG has the strongest week and year. Management fees are shown as factual comparison data; a fee difference does not, on its own, indicate that any fund is suitable for any particular purpose.
Which Companies Do These ETFs Share?
No company is held by all three funds, and none can be. QETH holds a single asset, so an empty centre in the diagram is a fact of construction rather than a finding about the market. BUGG and CLDD do overlap, on three names:
Company | What it does | Weight in BUGG | Weight in CLDD | 6 Aug – 15 Oct 2026 |
Qualys | Cloud-delivered vulnerability and compliance management | 5.96% | 4.0% | +6.0% |
Zscaler | Cloud-native secure access and zero-trust networking | 5.25% | 4.1% | +35.6% |
Akamai Technologies | Content delivery, edge computing and edge security | 3.96% | 3.1% | −22.1% |
Together the three are 15.17% of BUGG and 11.2% of CLDD. Both funds publish full holdings, and each comparison here uses the provider's published top 20 as at the dates stated; BUGG holds more than 30 positions and CLDD 38, so an additional overlap outside those lists cannot be ruled out. Weights are seven weeks old and will have drifted.
Why Do the Shared Holdings Split Rather Than Move Together?
The overlap between a cybersecurity index and a cloud index is, almost by definition, the companies that deliver security from the cloud. What this quarter shows is that the shared names are not one thing:
Zscaler is cloud-native, with no meaningful business selling appliances or bandwidth, and rose 35.6%.
Qualys, also cloud-native, has slowed sharply: +68.1% at the 28 August reading, +11.7% at the 18 September reading and +6.0% now.
Akamai is the oldest of the three and reached security from the other direction — it began as a content-delivery network and added edge security to an existing delivery business. It fell 22.1% over the window.
This is the fifth reading of the same overlap, and the divide has not closed. On 17 July 2026 the shared names carried no signal — Zscaler +8.0% and Akamai −1.5%. On 14 August 2026 Zscaler was +40.0% against Akamai −21.9%. On 28 August 2026 the spread was 61.6 points with Qualys at +68.1%. On 18 September 2026 Zscaler was +34.2% and Akamai −17.3%. At this reading Zscaler is +35.6% and Akamai −22.1%, a spread of 57.7 percentage points, and Akamai's fall is its deepest recorded. The windows differ between readings (this one runs 6 August to 15 October) so the figures are directional, not exact comparisons.
The intersection of these two funds is not a theme they both own — it is a boundary running through the middle of one. An investor reading the overlap as a concentrated shared bet on "cloud security" would have owned two things moving in opposite directions. One reading of an overlap is a snapshot; five readings of the same overlap are what separate a structural split from a single bad month.
Why Did Three Different Funds Produce Similar Results?
They did not produce them the same way: three similar quarterly numbers, three unrelated engines.
BUGG's return sits across its own book rather than in one block. Over 6 August to 15 October its largest positions returned: Okta +45.3% (8.6% of the fund), Rubrik +40.2% (5.53%), CrowdStrike +17.9% (7.49%), Fortinet +13.6% (7.51%), SentinelOne +12.6% (4.41%) and Palo Alto Networks +3.0% (7.82%). The spread between the best and worst of those six is 42.3 percentage points, so the fund's weekly return of +15.74% cannot be traced to a single holding from these closing prices alone.
CLDD's return again sits in its middle weights, not its largest. ServiceNow returned +26.6% (4.5%), Paycom +17.1% (5.3%), Datadog +16.1% (5.2%), Workday +15.5% (4.5%) and Cloudflare +11.2% (4.3%) — while Snowflake, the fund's largest holding at 6.9%, returned 5.4%. A fund's top holding and a fund's driver are frequently not the same position.
QETH's return is the ether price, and nothing else. It has no constituents to attribute, which makes it the one fund in the trio whose figure requires no interpretation. QETH's weekly return was −1.65% but its monthly return was +28.59%, the best in the trio, and its one-year return improved to −49.81% from −61.72% a week earlier. The four ASX bitcoin funds in the same export returned between 24.72% and 27.80% over the quarter, so ether again ranks above bitcoin on the quarter.
Company price figures are dated closing prices from stockanalysis.com for 6 August to 15 October 2026, a window roughly three weeks shorter than the funds' own 90-day measurement period, and are used for company prices only.
Related FMP Coverage
The full board these three funds lead: the weekly ASX ETF ranking
The same two software funds compared with HACK: when cloud overtook cybersecurity on this board
The previous board's trio, with no equity fund among them: last week's leading trio
The category-level view: the ETF category league table
Access the Research Behind This Comparison
Finer Market Points publishes the weekly Top 30 ASX momentum data — the same proprietary research framework behind this ETF analysis. Members receive the underlying educational data and weekly analysis discussed in reports like this one through the FMP YouTube Membership.
Remember that past performance is no guarantee of future results, and all trading involves risk.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the difference between BUGG, CLDD and QETH?
BUGG is the Global X Cybersecurity ETF, tracking the Indxx Cybersecurity Index across more than 30 predominantly US pure-play cybersecurity companies. CLDD is the Betashares Cloud Computing ETF, tracking the Indxx Global Cloud Computing Index across 38 cloud infrastructure and software-as-a-service businesses. QETH is the Betashares Ethereum ETF and is not an equity fund at all: it aims to track the price of ether in Australian dollars by investing in the NYSE-listed Bitwise Ethereum ETF, and holds no companies. All three are ASX-listed and unhedged.
Do BUGG and CLDD hold the same companies?
Three, from their published top 20 holdings: Qualys, at 5.96% of BUGG and 4.0% of CLDD; Zscaler, at 5.25% and 4.1%; and Akamai Technologies, at 3.96% and 3.1%. Together those three are 15.17% of BUGG and 11.2% of CLDD. BUGG holds more than 30 positions and CLDD holds 38, so an overlap outside each provider's published top 20 cannot be ruled out. Holdings are as at 28 August 2026 for BUGG and 27 August 2026 for CLDD.
Why is Akamai falling while Zscaler rises?
The shared names are not the same kind of business. Zscaler is a cloud-native security company with no meaningful appliance or bandwidth business, and it returned 35.6% over 6 August to 15 October 2026. Akamai reached security from the opposite direction, as a content-delivery network that added edge security to an existing delivery business, and it returned −22.1% over the same window. This is the fifth reading of the overlap Finer Market Points has recorded since 17 July 2026, and Akamai has been negative at every reading.
Does QETH hold any shares?
No. QETH holds a single asset, ether, obtained by investing in the NYSE-listed Bitwise Ethereum ETF, whose underlying ether is held offline in cold storage by a global digital asset custodian. It has no portfolio of companies, so it cannot share a holding with an equity fund such as BUGG or CLDD. Betashares charges 0.45% per annum, reported net assets of A$31.2 million as at 27 August 2026, does not expect the fund to make distributions, and states that the fund should be considered extremely high risk and is suitable only for informed investors with a very high risk tolerance seeking an allocation of 5% or less.
Which of these three ETFs charges the lowest management fee?
QETH charges 0.45% per annum, BUGG 0.47% and CLDD 0.67%. Additional costs apply to QETH as set out in its product disclosure statement. These figures are factual comparison data only: the three funds hold entirely different assets, and a difference in management fee does not on its own indicate that any of them is appropriate for any particular purpose.
Why did BUGG and CLDD return to the top three?
BUGG's quarterly return rose from 16.06% to 33.48% and CLDD's from 17.58% to 28.88% between the 10 October and 15 October 2026 readings, lifting them from 8th and 7th place to 2nd and 3rd. BUGG's weekly return of +15.74% was the largest of the 453 funds reporting a weekly return and CLDD's weekly return was +7.62%. The data records the change and does not establish a cause.
How were these three ETFs chosen for comparison?
By rank, not by selection. Finer Market Points ranks every fund in its weekly ETF export that carries a usable quarterly return — 447 of 471 for the export dated 15 October 2026 — and compares whichever three finish on top. This week those were QETH at +35.32%, BUGG at +33.48% and CLDD at +28.88%. The trio changes as the board changes — the same three funds led on 28 August 2026 in the order BUGG, CLDD, QETH — so no fund appears here because it was judged interesting. Every fund fact comes from the issuer's own disclosure rather than a third-party aggregator.
Which of these ETFs had the strongest week?
BUGG, at +15.74% over the week to 15 October 2026 — the largest weekly return of the 453 funds reporting one. CLDD returned +7.62% and QETH −1.65% over the same week. On the monthly measure the order reverses: QETH returned +28.59%, BUGG +5.62% and CLDD +0.44%.
Sources
# | Source | Detail | Accessed |
1 | Finer Market Points, weekly ETF performance export | Weekly, monthly, quarterly and one-year returns for 471 ASX-listed exchange traded products, as at 15 Oct 2026 | 16 Oct 2026 |
2 | Global X — BUGG fund page | BUGG index, management fee, fund size, inception, holdings count and top 20 holdings with weights, as at 28 Aug 2026 | 29 Aug 2026 |
3 | Betashares — CLDD fund page | CLDD index, management fee, net assets, holdings count, inception, distribution frequency and top 20 holdings with weights, as at 27 Aug 2026 | 29 Aug 2026 |
4 | Betashares — QETH fund page | QETH structure, underlying fund, custody arrangement, management fee, net assets, inception, distribution policy and the issuer's own risk statement, as at 27 Aug 2026 | 29 Aug 2026 |
5 | stockanalysis.com | Constituent closing prices only (Qualys, Zscaler, Akamai, Okta, Palo Alto Networks, Fortinet, CrowdStrike, Rubrik, SentinelOne, Snowflake, Paycom, Datadog, Workday, ServiceNow, Cloudflare), 6 Aug – 15 Oct 2026 | 16 Oct 2026 |
6 | Finer Market Points | Momentum research framework, ETF watchlist methodology and the prior readings of the BUGG–CLDD overlap dated 17 Jul, 14 Aug, 28 Aug and 18 Sep 2026 | 16 Oct 2026 |
All fund facts on this page come from each provider's own fund page; third-party sources are used for company share closing prices only. Constituent price movements are directional, computed from stockanalysis.com dated daily closes between 6 August and 15 October 2026 — a window roughly three weeks shorter than the funds' own 90-day measurement period.
This content is for educational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.
The information, opinions and other materials appearing on this website are of a general nature only and shall not be construed as advice. Finer Market Points Pty Ltd, CAR 1304002, AFSL 526688, ABN 87 645 284 680. This general information is educational only and not financial advice, recommendation, forecast or solicitation. This is not taxation advice. Rose Bay Equities accepts no responsibility for the accuracy or completeness of the information, opinions or other materials provided on or accessible through this website. This website has not been prepared with reference to your individual financial or personal circumstances. You should not rely on any advice on this website without first seeking appropriate professional, financial and legal advice. Further, where Rose Bay Equities makes third party material available or accessible through this website you acknowledge that Rose Bay Equities is a distributor and not a publisher of that content and that its editorial control is limited to the selection of those materials to make available. We accept no liability for any loss or damages arising from use. Authors and presenters may hold positions in discussed companies and investment products.
Comments