A new physical Exchange Traded Commodity on oil is set to be listed on the London Stock Exchange. The product, issued by Onyx ETC Securities PLC, uses Daily Dated Brent futures rather than standard Brent or WTI contracts, aiming to reduce the roll distortion that penalises competing instruments. Performance and backtest data show a significant cumulative outperformance relative to the leading competing ETC.
Sign up to our free newsletters
Article created by the editorial staff of ETFWorld.co.uk
Greg Newman, CEO of Onyx Capital Group
Product technical features
The Onyx Spot Return Crude Oil ETC is a fully collateralised, synthetic (swap-based) Exchange Traded Commodity. The issuer is Onyx ETC Securities PLC, an Irish vehicle with a technical listing already active on Euronext Dublin.
The product does not invest in generic Brent or WTI futures contracts. Instead, it uses Daily Dated Brent Futures, daily cash-settled contracts that track the Platt’s Dated Brent assessment. Each contract is for 1,000 barrels, is quoted in US dollars and has a minimum tick of $0.001 per barrel.
The decision to adopt this underlying asset is the ETC’s distinctive feature.
Whilst traditional ETCs track indices based on front-month Brent futures (two-month delivery), Daily Dated Brent Futures reflect the price of physical lots for delivery within 1–2 weeks.
The exposure is to total return and comprises two components: the price change of the Dated Brent futures and a Daily Adjustment representing the interest income on the collateral, net of all fees.
The rollover mechanism follows a predetermined weekly schedule. The swap counterparty and Authorised Participant is Onyx Commodities Limited, a group company regulated by the FCA (FRN 778117).
The Total Expense Ratio (TER) is 0.99% per annum. This figure is more than double the 0.49% applied by WisdomTree’s Brent and WTI ETCs.
The benchmark: Dated Brent
Dated Brent is the primary benchmark for the price of physical oil. It is used to price approximately 80% of global physical crude oil transactions. Oil companies, refineries and traders use it to value and hedge North Sea crude oil cargoes.
The key difference from standard Brent futures is timing. A front-month Brent future reflects the expected price for delivery in approximately two months. Dated Brent reflects the spot price of physical barrels with a loading window of 1 to 2 weeks. Under conditions of physical supply stress, this time lag generates price divergences that can be very pronounced.
In April 2026, Dated Brent closed at $131.97 per barrel, whilst ICE Brent front-month futures stood below $97: a spread of around $35, unprecedented since the benchmark’s inception.
The Daily Dated Brent Future contract is listed on ICE Futures Europe under the symbol DDB and trades for up to 180 consecutive days. Final settlement uses the average of the ‘Mid’ quotes published on Platt’s Crude Oil Marketwire under the heading ‘Brent (Dated)’.
The team
Three names carry particular weight in the construction of the Dated Brent benchmark:
Jorge Montepeque, Head of Benchmarks at Onyx, is the creator of the Dated Brent benchmark from the 1980s, when he worked at Platts (S&P Global Commodity Insights). He was responsible for the Market-on-Close (MOC) pricing mechanism, the ‘window’ through which prices for billions of dollars’ worth of derivatives and physical cargoes are formed each day.- Greg Newman, CEO of Onyx Capital Group, was the first market maker on Dated Brent before founding Onyx. Prior to that, he had set up Mandara Capital’s crude oil desk at the age of 22.
- Manny Newman, Head of Crude and equity partner at Onyx, currently manages the largest volume of market making on Dated Brent products globally.
Onyx Capital Group is the world’s leading liquidity provider in oil derivatives, with annual volumes exceeding $2 trillion and revenues of over £200 million. In certain benchmarks, including Dated Brent, the group’s combined market share reaches 80%.
Performance differential
Available data show a significant performance gap between the Onyx ETC and the WisdomTree Brent Crude Oil ETC (BRNT), which tracks the Bloomberg Brent Crude Sub Total Return Index based on front-month Brent futures.
Since the start of 2026, the Onyx product has risen by around 140%, compared with around 82% for the WisdomTree Brent Crude Oil ETC. The performance gap is over 43 percentage points.
According to a backtest conducted by Onyx covering the period 2016–2025, the new ETC would have outperformed BRNT by an average of 8% per annum. This result is attributed to a more efficient roll mechanism and lower structural friction in the benchmark.
The gap can be explained by the different nature of the underlying assets. During periods of tension in the physical market — such as those observed in 2026 — Dated Brent rises more rapidly and by a greater margin than deferred futures, which discount expectations of normalisation. Consequently, an ETC tracking Dated Brent captures the full spot price rise, whilst an ETC based on front-month futures remains anchored to prices that incorporate a time and uncertainty premium.
Issuance and listing structure
The ETC obtained a technical listing on Euronext Dublin in early 2026. Orders are currently routed directly to the Authorised Participant, Onyx Commodities Limited. The company has announced its intention to commence trading on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) live order book within the year.
The legal structure is that of a collateralised ETC under Irish law. The securities (Onyx Spot Crude Oil Securities) are backed by a portfolio of Daily Dated Brent Futures contracts held and managed by Onyx Commodities Limited in its capacity as Exposure Provider. The price of the securities is determined daily based on the value of that portfolio, as reported to the Calculation Agent.
Access to an OTC market
The OTC Dated Brent Spot Return contract on which the ETC is based has so far been accessible only to professional traders and institutions with specialised infrastructure. Listing in ETC format allows retail and institutional investors to access the same exposure without having to manage storage, insurance or physical delivery of crude oil.
The product’s terms and conditions stipulate that the investor cannot lose more than the capital invested.
Summary of key data
| Item | Detail |
| Product name | Onyx Spot Return Crude Oil ETC |
| Issuer | Onyx ETC Securities PLC |
| Underlying | Daily Dated Brent Futures (ICE: DDB) |
| Tracking | Synthetic (swap-based), fully collateralised |
| Authorised Participant | Onyx Commodities Limited |
| TER | 0.99% |
| Current listing | Euronext Dublin (technical); LSE expected by 2026 |
| Roll management | Predetermined weekly roll |
| Maximum risk | Invested capital |
Final considerations
The Onyx Spot Return Crude Oil ETC introduces a replication mechanism based on the physical spot price, rather than forward futures, into the range of oil ETPs. The available performance data — both actual figures from the start of 2026 and retrospective data for the decade 2016–2025 — indicate a systematic positive outperformance relative to competing products.
The TER of 0.99% represents a higher cost compared to traditional ETCs (0.49% for WisdomTree). Investors must therefore assess whether the expected return differential — historically estimated at around 8 percentage points per annum — offsets the higher management costs.
For those seeking exposure to oil aligned with actual prices on the physical market, this ETC represents a viable alternative to products based on standard futures. The choice of benchmark, in this case, has a measurable impact on performance.
Source : ETFWorld.co.uk
Subscribe to Our Newsletter
