“Gun stocks” on this site refer to retail gun & ammo maker/seller stocks.

There are 9 of them in the US stock market.

You can customize the selection when you test funds.

Are we missing a stock? Let us know.

While Goodbye Gun Stocks does not offer investment advice, here are some facts to consider.

Tiny Portion of the Market

Gun & ammo maker stocks have had high returns in the past. However, even if some of gun & ammo maker/seller stocks continue to rally, they only make up for 0.51% of the US total stock market. Removing them from your diversified fund portfolio using Goodbye Gun Stocks should not dramatically lower your returns.

Gun & Ammunition Makers

Maker stocks have done exceptionally well in recent years. However, this does not necessarily mean that this is a highly recommended investment.

1. These stocks also make up very high risk portfolio, whose fluctuation level (standard deviation of monthly returns) is higher than 99.5% of all funds in our database. You can see the backtest on Hello Money.
2. Past performance does not guarantee future returns, and gun stocks didn't always have high returns. For instance: In the 1990s, the majority of the domestic gun market was hunters and target shooters, and the market continued to decline, as shooting went out of favor like chain smoking. Ruger stock price dropped 51.6% between late 1996 to 2000.
3. Your fund portfolio likely consists of hundreds of stocks, if not thousands. Gun & ammo maker stocks make up only 0.03% of US total stock market index.

Retail Sellers

This group of stocks is dominated by Wal-Mart, whose market cap is significantly bigger than the others.

They have slightly higher annual returns than the S&P 500, while the risk (fluctuation of monthly returns) is significantly higher. You can see the backtest on Hello Money.

The seller stocks only take up 0.48% of US total stock market index.

You Can Compete

You can find financially competitive gun-free alternatives a majority of the time.

When we tested the largest stock funds in the US, among the most competitive on the market, we were able to find at least one alternative fund that meet all the following criteria for over 50% of the largest US stock funds:

1. Same fund category as the original fund
2. 0% in gun & ammo maker/seller stocks
3. Expense ratio less than or equal to the original fund
4. Better or equal bottom line (gains including expenses and dividends) for a majority of available timeframes

Total market index funds, certain sector and market cap funds are more likely to include gun maker and seller stocks.

Top 3 Fund Companies

Here are the total amounts invested by each of the top 3 fund companies as of March 20, 2016.

• Vanguard: $5.71B (0.267% of net assets)
• Fidelity: $791.2M (0.088% of net assets)
• American: $14.1M (0.002% of net assets)

Federal TSP Funds

If you are a federal employee investing in the TSP program, we have some answers for you too.

• C Fund: $846.00M (0.6% of fund)
• S Fund: $161.92M (0.32% of fund)
• L2050 Fund: $11.27M (0.31% of fund)

Fund Categories

Certain categories of funds are more likely to contain gun/ammo maker and seller stocks.

• U.S. Large Value, U.S. Large Blend, Consumer Defensive Sector: Likely to include Wal-Mart
• U.S. Mid-Cap Blend: Likely to include Dick's Sporting Goods
• U.S. Small-Cap Value: Likely to include Olin

How About Bond & Money Market Funds?

We're currently only able to screen stock funds for gun and ammo maker/seller stocks. Your fund may contain corporate bonds for gun companies but we cannot easily test for it. Where possible, we provide links to SEC filings for bond funds if you want to dig deeper yourself.

You can find over 24,000 mutual funds and ETFs from over 700 fund brands on Goodbye Gun Stocks. As a general rule of thumb: If your fund has a symbol (like “VFINX” for Vanguard 500 Index Fund), you can likely find it.

If you can’t find yours, here are the likely reasons:

Custom Retirement Funds

Some 401(k) or pension funds are custom-made for the retirement plan and do not disclose its information publicly, as mutual funds and ETFs are required to. For example: Apple’s employee 401(k) plan includes “Vanguard Employee Benefit Index” only available to specific 401(k) plans. Goodbye Gun Stocks cannot analyze these funds due to lack of available information.

Non-Mutual Funds

Some financial products have names that sound like mutual funds, but they are not. For example: Northwestern Mutual Funds are technically annuities, not mutual funds.

Partial Data

This means we found some of the holdings in the fund, but were unable to find all of them.

Generally, Target Retirement and Retirement Income funds have this problem. Even with partial data we are able to identify gun-related stocks in 80% of these funds since they typically hold such a wide-reaching array of assets.

If we found gun-related stocks in those funds, we display those funds so you can know if you own gun stocks. You can also use Goodbye Gun Stocks to find alternative funds with:

• Lower known gun stocks holdings
• Higher past returns
• Lower expenses

Unknown

This means we were not able to find the SEC filing for this fund, or were unable to identify any of the fund's holdings in the filing.

We currently don't support funds that are not US stock funds (e.g. bond funds, international funds, etc.) and we display them as unknown. Less than 5% of the funds on this site have this problem.

Even if it said the fund’s gun stock holdings are “unknown,” you can also use Goodbye Gun Stocks to find alternative funds with:

• Higher past returns
• Lower expenses

Stigmatization

Divestment movements don’t necessarily try to directly hurt the stock price or product sales like a consumer boycott. However, stigmatization and public disapproval forces the consumers and financiers to be more conscious about their decision to purchase from or invest in the businesses.

Increased Business Risk

Sufficient stigmatization can eventually hurt the target businesses. For example:

• Fossil fuel company valuations are in question as more climate policies are announced, triggering a new and bigger wave of divestment.
• Warren Buffett changed his position on tobacco, saying even if the economics of the business is good, the future may not be bright.
• Gun stocks plummeted in the 1990s as it became uncool to be a shooter.

Fast Growing Trend

Divestment movements are evolving from a simple form of protest, to a proactive strategy to de-fund short sighted businesses. Leading the trend is fossil fuel divestment, where $3.4T of assets have been pledged to divest.

Opportunities

Divestment isn’t always easy. The definition of what's sustainable or pro-social can differ between people. For most people with fund portfolios, it's not so easy to find out what to do and execute the switch. We built Goodbye Gun Stocks to make the second part easier.

For more info, see our op-ed on the divestment trend: The Faces of Divestment: Ron Conway, Leonardo DiCaprio, Al Gore, and Snoop Dogg.