Tobacco use remains one of the world’s leading causes of preventable illness and death. Despite decades of public health efforts, more than a billion people continue to smoke, creating substantial and long-lasting impacts on health systems, economies and societies.
A Brief History of Tobacco Use
- Tobacco was used for centuries by indigenous peoples in the Americas.
- Global spread accelerated from the sixteenth century onward.
- The invention of the cigarette-making machine in the late nineteenth century transformed tobacco into a mass-market product.
- Cigarette consumption surged, leading to a sharp rise in tobacco-related disease.
Scientific Breakthroughs and Rising Awareness
Landmark studies in the 1950s and 1960s established the causal link between smoking and:
- Lung cancer
- Cardiovascular disease
- Other chronic conditions
By this point, smoking had become responsible for an enormous global disease burden.
Key health impacts of smoking include:
- Cancer (lung, throat, mouth, oesophagus, pancreas, bladder)
- Cardiovascular disease, including heart attacks and strokes
- Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), including emphysema
Regulation and Public-Health Action
In response to the ever-growing evidence base linking smoking to disease, governments have introduced increasingly strict tobacco-control measures, including:
- Advertising bans
- Large health warnings
- Higher excise taxes
- Smoke-free laws
These policies have reduced smoking rates in many countries — yet tobacco use remains a major global problem.
Tobacco Use in 2025: A Crisis Still Affecting 1.2 Billion People
- Around 1.2 billion people still smoke today, and almost 1 in 5 adults worldwide.
- Nearly 80% of smokers live in low- and middle-income countries.
- WHO estimates over 7 million deaths per year linked directly to smoking.
- Tobacco use has long-lasting impacts on families, economies, and health systems, highlighting the urgent need for continued global efforts to reduce consumption.
Further reading:
Next article: The Concept of Tobacco Harm Reduction (THR)
An investor should consider the investment objectives, risks, and charges and expenses of the fund carefully before investing. A prospectus which contains this and other information about the fund may be obtained by calling 1-800-617-0004, or by clicking here. The prospectus should be read carefully before investing.
Investing involves risk. Principal loss is possible. The Fund is a recently organized entity, giving prospective investors a limited track record on which to base their investment decision. The Fund’s investments will be concentrated in the securities of issuers in the tobacco, or nicotine - related group of industries. The tobacco industry is subject to significant risks and uncertainties that could materially and adversely affect the financial condition and cash flows, of companies operating in it. Investing in foreign securities typically involves more risks than investing in U.S. securities, and includes risks associated with: (i) internal and external political and economic developments – e.g., the political, economic and social policies and structures of some foreign countries may be less stable and more volatile than those in the U.S. or some foreign countries may be subject to trading restrictions or economic sanctions; (ii) trading practices – e.g., government supervision and regulation of foreign securities and currency markets, trading systems and brokers may be less than in the U.S.; (iii) availability of information – e.g., foreign issuers may not be subject to the same disclosure, accounting and financial reporting standards and practices as U.S. issuers; (iv) limited markets – e.g., the securities of certain foreign issuers may be less liquid (harder to sell) and more volatile; and (v) currency exchange rate fluctuations and policies. Investment in emerging market securities involves greater risk than that associated with investment in securities of issuers in developed foreign countries.
Derivatives may pose risks in addition to and greater than those associated with investing directly in securities, currencies or other investments, including risks relating to leverage, imperfect correlations with underlying investments or the Fund’s other portfolio holdings, high price volatility, lack of availability, counterparty credit, liquidity, valuation and legal restrictions. A total return swap is a contract in which one party agrees to make periodic payments to another party based on the change in market value of the assets underlying the contract, which may include a specified security, basket of securities, or securities indices during the specified period, in return for periodic payments based on a fixed or variable interest rate or the total return from other underlying assets. The Fund is a non-diversified, investment company under the 1940 Act. Because the Fund is non-diversified, it will invest a greater percentage of its assets in the securities of a limited number of issuers. Investing in medium and small capitalization companies may involve special risks because those companies may have narrower product lines, more limited financial resources, fewer experienced managers, dependence on a few key employees, and a more limited trading market for their stocks, as compared with larger companies. The securities of micro-cap companies may be more volatile in price, have wider spreads between their bid and ask prices, and have significantly lower trading volumes than the securities of larger capitalization companies.
ETFs are subject to risks that the market price of an ETF's shares may trade at a premium or discount to its net asset value, an active secondary trading market may not develop or be maintained, or trading may be halted by the exchange in which they trade, which may impact an ETF's ability to sell its shares. Shares of any ETF are bought and sold at market price (not NAV) and are not individually redeemed from the ETF. Brokerage commissions will reduce returns
The Hexis Active Nicotine Engagement ETF is distributed by Quasar Distributors, LLC
Definitions used on these pages:
R&D: Research and development spend – investment in developing new products, technologies, or capabilities.
M&A: Mergers and acquisitions spend – spending on acquiring or merging with other companies to expand scale, capabilities, or market access.
Capex: Capital expenditure – investment in long-term physical or intangible assets such as facilities, equipment, or infrastructure.
Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) model – a valuation method that estimates a company’s value by discounting its expected future cash flows back to today.
Terminal value – the estimated value of a business beyond the explicit forecast period in a DCF model.
Terminal growth rate – the assumed long-term, steady growth rate used to calculate terminal value.
EV: Enterprise Value – a measure of a company’s total value, calculated as market capitalisation plus net debt
EBITDA: Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation