An ETN tracking 4x the daily return of the S&P 500 Total Return Index. The annual fee is 2.95%, which is very high.
Prices as of 2026-10-23. Source: Data via FinanceDataReader · Policy rate via FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis).
SPYU is a 4x S&P 500 ETN issued by Bank of Montreal (BMO). It listed in December 2023 and traded as XXXX until May 2024. It is not a fund but a note in which the bank promises the index return, so you are exposed to the issuer's credit and its decision to redeem early.
A 4x multiple means a 25% one-day fall in the index would in theory wipe out the note. US circuit breakers make a 25% single-day drop unlikely, but over a multi-day decline losses deepen far faster than in a 3x fund. During the April 2025 tariff shock it fell more than 60% from its high in a short span.
With only about two years of history, most of the ten-year table on this page is empty. A backtest here records the short period this note has existed, not proof that it survives a bear market. For the long-run behaviour of the same index, check the 3x fund (UPRO) or the 1x fund (SPY) first. The early redemption of FNGU by the same issuer in 2025 is covered in ETN vs ETF.
Using real closing prices only (adjusted for splits and dividends) from 2023-12-04, SPYU's worst peak-to-trough fall was -62.3%, from the 2024-12-04 high to the 2025-04-08 low over 84 trading days. It took another 122 trading days (about 0.5 years) to get back above that high, on 2025-10-02. The last close is 13.8% below the all-time high.
A fall of 62.3% needs a 165% gain to get back to even. Any strategy on SPYU has to be judged on whether you could have held it through a stretch like this. Why drawdown comes before return.
The standard deviation of daily returns is 3.79% over the whole history
and 3.18% over the last year. By the rough rule
days ≈ (target ÷ daily volatility)², a 1.5% take-profit target needs about
less than one trading day at the recent pace, so most tranches close at the target well before the time cut.
Where the rule comes from.
Three preset strategies run over 2023-12-04 to 2026-10-23 with a $10,000 seed and 0.1% fees, alongside simply holding the same instrument.
| Strategy | Return | Max drawdown | CAGR | Trades | Win rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A2 Standard, base rules (no defence signal) | +110.25% | -30.03% | +29.52% | 323 | 80.2% |
| A1 Defensive, base rules | +57.97% | -21.77% | +17.25% | 324 | 86.4% |
| A3 Aggressive, base rules (no defence signal) | +84.49% | -36.28% | +23.76% | 309 | 79.6% |
| Buy and hold | +203.48% | -62.25% | +47.17% | - | - |
Read the drawdown column before the return column. Split buying leaves much of the seed in cash, which is the main reason its drawdown is smaller — treat it as lower exposure rather than protection.
Test SPYU with your own settings →The standard (diamond) preset, one calendar year at a time. A strategy worth using should have good years and bad years mixed — if one year made everything, that was the year, not the rules.
| Year | Strategy | Strategy MDD | Buy and hold | B&H MDD |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | +18.94% | -16.27% | +16.89% | -36.29% |
| 2025 | +38.21% | -28.96% | +18.38% | -61.09% |
| 2024 | +17.41% | -12.06% | +65.13% | -31.97% |
| 2023 | - | - | - | - |
| 2022 | - | - | - | - |
| 2021 | - | - | - | - |
| 2020 | - | - | - | - |
| 2019 | - | - | - | - |
| 2018 | - | - | - | - |
| 2017 | - | - | - | - |
Across these 3 years the strategy beat buy and hold in 2 and trailed it in 1. It lost money in 0 years; buy and hold lost in 0. In SPYU's worst year here, 2026, holding returned +16.9% while the strategy returned +18.9%. In its best year, 2024, holding returned +65.1% and the strategy +17.4%. Giving up much of the best years is the price of the smaller drawdowns.
SPYU listed on 2023-12-04, and every number on this page uses real prices only. In the backtest tool you can go back to 1993, but the years before listing are index-based: SPYU listed on 2023-12-04. Prices from 1993-01-29 to the day before listing are converted from the 1x index, not real trades: the daily return of the S&P 500 1x ETF SPY with dividends reinvested multiplied by 4, minus the fund fee (2.95%/yr), borrowing cost (3x the 13-week T-bill rate) and an extra 6.0%/yr tracking cost. Treat that range as an estimate. Over the years where both exist, the index-based series still ran ahead of the real product, so treat the index-based range as optimistic. See how the index-based history is built and checked.
Only for a single day. Over longer stretches volatility drag pulls the result below 4x in choppy markets and above it in a sustained trend. The arithmetic is here.
An ETN is an unsecured promise from a bank, not a fund holding assets. If the issuer fails or decides to redeem early, you have no claim on anything. What separates an ETN from an ETF.
Whole shares only. If a tranche is allocated less than one share's price, it buys nothing. Raise the seed or lower the number of tranches.
The Today's Orders page computes the next session's buy limit and each tranche's sell target from your start date. It is a calculation, not advice, and no orders are placed.