Talk Your Book: The Next Generation of Income Strategies

“Anything that can be ETF’d will be ETF’d.” That line, from Janus Henderson’s Mike Laughlin, sets up the central premise of this episode of Animal Spirits: the structured product market—specifically autocallable notes and stability notes—is now being poured into the ETF wrapper at a rapid pace. Laughlin, an executive director and ETF client product specialist, explains why these complex income strategies have exploded in popularity, how they actually work under the hood, and what risks investors need to understand before diving in.

Why Structured Products Are Booming

The structured note market itself is about 40 years old, but incorporating these instruments into an ETF is new. For advisors, the old way of doing this—selling one-off structured notes to individual clients—was operationally intensive, typically limited to brokerage accounts and larger clients. The ETF wrapper removes that burden, allowing advisors to use these strategies across their entire book of business.

But the deeper driver is psychological. “Investing is inherently an emotional and uncertain activity,” Laughlin says. “Anything that can provide definition around investing—structuring defined risk and outcomes—is something people inherently gravitate toward.” In a world where clients crave clarity, structured products offer a clear trade-off: a defined yield in exchange for a defined risk.