BUGG vs HACK vs TECH: When a Theme Reaches Beyond Its Own Funds
- Christopher Hall
- Jul 31
- 9 min read
Updated: Aug 7
Written by Christopher Hall, AdvDipFP | Authorised Representative, AFSL 526688 | Updated August 2026
Data current as of 7 August 2026.
The Global X Cybersecurity ETF (BUGG), the Betashares Global Cybersecurity ETF (HACK) and the Global X Global Technology ETF (TECH) are the three best-performing ASX-listed ETFs over the quarter to 7 August 2026, returning +39.57%, +34.98% and +24.04% respectively (Australian Warrant Exchange data). Two of the three are cybersecurity funds — the third is not. TECH is a diversified, moat-screened technology fund spanning semiconductors, hardware, software and networking. Yet exactly two companies sit inside all three funds' top holdings, and both are cybersecurity names.
That was the story a week ago, and it still describes the shape of the board. What has changed since is more interesting: the return has moved to companies that only one of the three funds holds. The names carrying this quarter are no longer the network-security platforms shared across the funds — they are the identity, vulnerability and exposure-management specialists concentrated in BUGG alone.
What Each ETF Is Built to Do
All three are technology-tilted, but they are built on different principles:
BUGG — global pure-play cybersecurity. Tracks the Indxx Cybersecurity Index: a concentrated basket of roughly 30 companies whose principal business is cybersecurity — endpoint, network, identity and cloud security software, predominantly US-listed. Little sits in the book that is not cyber.
HACK — global cybersecurity, broad build. Tracks the Nasdaq Consumer Technology Association Cybersecurity Index. It holds the same cyber platform leaders at the top, but its wider book also carries large-cap technology, networking and IT-services names — Cisco, Broadcom, Arista Networks, Alphabet and Infosys among them.
TECH — developed-market technology, screened for a moat. Tracks the Morningstar Developed Markets Technology Moat Focus Index: technology companies that Morningstar assesses as holding a durable competitive advantage and trading at an attractive valuation. It is a quality-and-value screen laid across the whole technology sector rather than a bet on any single sub-theme, and it reaches into Japanese component makers as well as US software and chips.
Side-by-Side Comparison
BUGG | HACK | TECH | |
Provider | Global X | Betashares | Global X |
Index tracked | Indxx Cybersecurity | Nasdaq CTA Cybersecurity | Morningstar Developed Markets Technology Moat Focus |
What it holds | ~30 pure-play cyber stocks | ~42 cyber + large-cap IT names | Diversified developed-market technology |
Structure | Physical index ETF | Physical index ETF | Physical index ETF |
Management fee & costs (p.a.) | 0.47% | 0.67% | 0.45% |
Fund size | A$34.2M | A$1.56B | A$342.9M |
Currency | Unhedged | Unhedged | Unhedged |
Inception (ASX) | Sep 2023 | Aug 2016 | Apr 2017 |
Quarterly total return | +39.57% | +34.98% | +24.04% |
Quarterly total returns sourced from the Australian Warrant Exchange (AXW), an ASX market, to 7 August 2026. Provider data (index, holdings, fees, fund size) from Global X and Betashares as at 10–16 July 2026. Fees are management fees and costs per annum as published by the provider, and do not, on their own, indicate suitability.
Where the Three Funds Overlap — and Where They Don't
Comparing each fund's top-20 holdings, two companies are held by all three — and both are cybersecurity platform leaders:
Held by all three | BUGG | HACK | TECH |
Palo Alto Networks | 7.83% | 9.8% | 2.98% |
Fortinet | 7.56% | 9.1% | 2.81% |
Beneath that shared pair, the overlap splits into two separate pockets. BUGG and HACK share a cybersecurity core that TECH does not reach:
Held by BUGG + HACK only | BUGG | HACK |
CrowdStrike | 7.25% | 8.7% |
Okta | 7.95% | 3.7% |
Akamai | 4.57% | 2.8% |
Rubrik | 4.46% | 2.6% |
Zscaler | 4.44% | 3.1% |
Gen Digital | 4.16% | 2.3% |
Check Point | 3.61% | 2.2% |
HACK and TECH share a second, smaller pocket that BUGG has no part of — the networking and data-infrastructure names that sit in a broad technology book but not in a pure-play cyber one: Broadcom (HACK 6.5%, TECH 3.59%), Arista Networks (HACK 2.1%, TECH 4.21%) and Datadog (HACK 2.1%, TECH 3.01%).
A third group matters more this quarter than any of the shared zones. BUGG holds a block of identity, vulnerability and exposure-management specialists that neither of the other two funds carries in its top 20 — Tenable (5.66%), Qualys (5.39%), Varonis (5.31%), SailPoint (4.13%), SentinelOne (4.12%) and Netskope (4.03%), alongside Okta at 7.95%, its largest single position.
In plain terms: picture two heavily overlapping circles (BUGG and HACK, sharing the cyber core) with a third circle (TECH) that clips the shared zone at two points — Palo Alto Networks and Fortinet — and otherwise touches only HACK, through networking hardware and data infrastructure. The block doing the work this quarter sits in the part of BUGG's circle that nothing else touches.
What Actually Led: The Theme Split in Two
Holding a stock and being driven by it are different things. Pulling each name's own price performance shows cybersecurity has divided into a group that ran and a group that did not:
Company | Held by | Quarterly move* |
Qualys | BUGG only | +85% |
Okta | BUGG + HACK | +60% |
Tenable | BUGG only | +48% |
Palo Alto Networks | BUGG + HACK + TECH | +45% |
Varonis | BUGG only | +40% |
Zscaler | BUGG + HACK | +29% |
CrowdStrike | BUGG + HACK | +29% |
Fortinet | BUGG + HACK + TECH | +25% |
Arista Networks | HACK + TECH | +25% |
Amphenol | TECH | +22% |
SentinelOne | BUGG only | +16% |
Datadog | HACK + TECH | +3% |
NVIDIA | TECH | +3% |
Broadcom | HACK + TECH | ~0% |
AMD | TECH | −1% |
Check Point | BUGG + HACK | −3% |
Constituent moves are directional, calculated from stockanalysis.com daily closes between 27 May and 6 August 2026 — a window roughly two and a half weeks shorter than the funds' 90-day total-return period — so treat the magnitudes as directional rather than exact.
Two things stand out. First, the leadership inside cybersecurity has rotated. Through July the story was the network-security platforms — Palo Alto Networks, Fortinet, CrowdStrike — held at high weight by both cyber funds. Over this window the strongest performers are the identity and exposure names: Qualys, Okta, Tenable and Varonis, all up 40% or more, against Fortinet at +25% and Check Point at −3%. Palo Alto Networks, which has been expanding beyond the firewall, sits between the two groups.
Second, the crossover has stopped explaining the board. A week ago Palo Alto Networks and Fortinet were the only two names in all three funds and both were running, which made the shared pair the explanation. Over the final week that pair separated — Palo Alto Networks rose about 8% while Fortinet fell about 1%. The names actually setting the pace now appear in one fund only.
Why the Board Finished in This Order
BUGG led on where its weight sits, not simply on purity. For three weeks the explanation for BUGG's lead was that its book is almost entirely cyber, with nothing to dilute the platform-leader move. This quarter gives a more precise reason: the identity-and-exposure block — Okta, Tenable, Qualys, Varonis, Zscaler and SentinelOne — accounts for roughly 33% of BUGG's book, and it was the best-performing corner of the theme. BUGG's lead over HACK widened back to about 4.6 percentage points from about 4.1 a week earlier.
HACK holds the incumbents, and the incumbents lagged. HACK carries Palo Alto Networks at 9.8% and Fortinet at 9.1% — the heaviest weights of any fund here — but only two of the identity-and-exposure names, for about 6.8% combined. Its large-cap IT ballast was close to neutral: Broadcom finished roughly flat and Datadog gave back about 14% in the final week alone.
TECH reached the podium on breadth, and slipped slightly. Palo Alto Networks and Fortinet together account for only about 5.8% of TECH's book, which cannot explain a +24.04% quarter. The rest came from connectivity and data infrastructure — Arista Networks (+25%) and Amphenol (+22%) — enough to offset a chip complex that went nowhere over the window (NVIDIA +3%, Broadcom roughly flat, AMD −1%). TECH's quarterly return was the only one in the top four to ease over the week, from +24.54% to +24.04%, with the Datadog fall the visible cause.
The pattern worth noting is how quickly a shared-name explanation can expire. When the crossover names are the strongest performers in every book that holds them, as they were a week ago, the overlap is the story. When the leaders move to a sub-segment that only one fund weights, two funds tracking the same theme can separate — and the fund-level ranking stops describing what is actually happening underneath it. Cyber first took this board in the BUGG vs HACK vs CLDD week, then led a board with no shared holding at all in BUGG vs HACK vs SEMI. The semiconductor engine that preceded it — now out of the Top 10 altogether — is detailed in how three funds reached the same return. Weekly rankings and the leading theme are tracked on the ASX ETF Top 10 by quarterly return, and the same 90-day lens applied to individual shares is on the Top 10 ASX momentum stocks board.
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Frequently Asked Questions
What do BUGG, HACK and TECH have in common?
Two companies sit in all three funds' top-20 holdings: Palo Alto Networks and Fortinet, both cybersecurity platform leaders. BUGG and HACK are both cybersecurity ETFs and share a wider core of seven further names, including CrowdStrike, Okta, Zscaler and Check Point. TECH is a diversified technology fund and connects to HACK through a separate pocket of networking and data-infrastructure names — Broadcom, Arista Networks and Datadog.
Why did a global technology ETF finish third on the ASX ETF board?
The Global X Global Technology ETF returned +24.04% over the quarter to 7 August 2026 on breadth rather than on any single theme. Its two shared cybersecurity holdings account for only about 5.8% of the book, so most of the return came from elsewhere — Arista Networks rose about 25% and Amphenol about 22% over the recent window, offsetting a flat chip complex (NVIDIA about +3%, Broadcom roughly flat, AMD about −1%). Its quarterly return eased slightly over the week, from +24.54% to +24.04%, after Datadog fell about 14% in that week alone.
What is the difference between BUGG and HACK?
Both are global cybersecurity ETFs holding the same platform leaders, but they are built differently. BUGG tracks the Indxx Cybersecurity Index and holds roughly 30 pure-play cybersecurity companies, including a large block of identity, vulnerability and exposure-management specialists — Okta, Tenable, Qualys, Varonis, Zscaler and SentinelOne — at about 33% of the book. HACK tracks the Nasdaq CTA Cybersecurity Index and holds around 42 names, weighting the network-security incumbents more heavily and adding large-cap technology, networking and IT-services companies. BUGG's management fee and costs are 0.47% a year against HACK's 0.67%, and HACK is the far larger fund at A$1.56 billion versus A$34.2 million. Fees, fund size and index construction are factual comparison points and do not, on their own, indicate suitability.
Which companies drove the top ASX ETFs this quarter?
The identity, vulnerability and exposure-management side of cybersecurity. Between 27 May and 6 August 2026, Qualys rose about 85%, Okta about 60%, Tenable about 48% and Varonis about 40%, against Fortinet at about 25% and Check Point at about −3%. Palo Alto Networks, at about +45%, sits between the two groups and is one of only two names held by all three leading funds. These are directional figures from stockanalysis.com daily closes over a window slightly shorter than the funds' 90-day return period.
Has the leading theme changed inside cybersecurity?
Yes. Through July the board was carried by the network-security platform leaders — Palo Alto Networks, Fortinet and CrowdStrike — which both cybersecurity funds hold at high weight. Over the quarter to 7 August 2026 the strongest performers are instead the identity and exposure-management names, several of which sit in BUGG's top 20 but not in HACK's. That is the mechanical reason BUGG's lead over HACK widened over the week rather than narrowing further.
Has cybersecurity led the ASX ETF board before?
Yes. The quarter to 7 August 2026 is the fourth consecutive week in which two cybersecurity ETFs have held the top two places on the Finer Market Points ASX ETF momentum ranking. The theme first took the board in the week to 17 July 2026, displacing a semiconductor and memory theme that had led the ranking through late June and early July.
Do these three ETFs hold Australian companies?
No. All three are ASX-listed funds that invest offshore — predominantly in US-listed technology companies, with TECH also holding Japanese and Canadian names. They are traded on the ASX in Australian dollars, and all three are unhedged, so returns to Australian holders also reflect movements in the Australian dollar. This is general, educational information only and does not consider any individual's objectives, financial situation or needs.
Sources
# | Source | Detail | Accessed |
1 | Australian Warrant Exchange (AXW), an ASX market | ASX-listed ETF price and quarterly total return data to 7 August 2026 | 7 Aug 2026 |
2 | Global X | BUGG and TECH fund profiles, index, holdings, fees and fund size | 10–16 Jul 2026 |
3 | Betashares | HACK fund profile, index, holdings, fees and fund size | 16 Jul 2026 |
4 | stockanalysis.com | Constituent daily closing prices (Qualys, Okta, Tenable, Varonis, Palo Alto Networks, Zscaler, CrowdStrike, Fortinet, Check Point, SentinelOne, Arista Networks, Amphenol, Datadog, AMD, NVIDIA, Broadcom), 27 May – 6 Aug 2026 | 7 Aug 2026 |
5 | Finer Market Points | Momentum research framework and ETF watchlist methodology | 7 Aug 2026 |
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