Question · ETFs
ProShares UltraPro Short Dow30 (SDOW) vs DXD and DOG
ProShares UltraPro Short Dow30 is the -3x member of a family of three Dow funds. The other two, DXD and DOG, short the same 30 stocks at -2x and -1x, and the multiple decides how long each one can sensibly be held.
Short answer
SDOW, DXD and DOG are ProShares funds that each aim for the opposite of one day's move in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, at -3x, -2x and -1x. All three use swaps and Dow futures and reset every evening. DOG suits a hedge held for days with regular checks, DXD a view over a day or two, and SDOW a single session you can watch.
A $10 rise in a $500 stock and a $10 rise in a $50 stock push the Dow up by exactly the same number of points. Every fund that shorts the Dow inherits that quirk.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average adds up the share prices of its 30 companies. Then it divides the total by a divisor. S&P Dow Jones Indices sets that divisor and changes it whenever a company is swapped in or out or a member splits its stock, so that the index level carries on from where it was instead of jumping on the day of the change. Market value plays no part. A giant company with a modest share price can count for less than a smaller one whose shares simply cost more.
What does price weighting mean for a fund that shorts the Dow?
The expensive stocks drive your fund. To see how much, take a hypothetical index with three members and a divisor of 3.
Both stocks rose by the same 5%. In Case A the -3x holder loses more than ten percent of the position, and in Case B a little over one, purely because of where each share price sits.
So check the calendar. Before holding SDOW, DXD or DOG through a week of earnings reports, look up which Dow members trade at the highest prices and when they report. A single expensive stock gapping higher after results can turn a quiet morning into a painful one for a short Dow position, even while most of the other 29 members drift lower.
Splits move the weights as well. When a high-priced member splits its shares, its price drops, the divisor is adjusted, and from then on that company moves the index less than it did the week before, though nothing about the business has changed.
How are SDOW, DXD and DOG built?
All three come from ProShares. All three track the same index. The table follows ProShares’ fund pages as of October 2026.
| Ticker | Fund | Daily objective | Inception (per ProShares) |
|---|---|---|---|
| DOG | ProShares Short Dow30 | -1x the Dow’s daily performance | June 19, 2006 |
| DXD | ProShares UltraShort Dow30 | -2x the Dow’s daily performance | July 11, 2006 |
| SDOW | ProShares UltraPro Short Dow30 | -3x the Dow’s daily performance | Feb. 9, 2010 |
None of them owns Dow stocks. ProShares lists the exposure as swap agreements on the Dow with several large banks, plus Dow mini futures contracts, while the cash is held as Treasury bills and shares of a ProShares money market fund. In a swap, the bank pays the fund when the Dow falls and collects from it when the Dow rises. That brings counterparty risk. If a bank fails to pay, the fund can lose money.
Each evening the fund resets. The SDOW prospectus spells out the mechanics: after a day the Dow rises, the fund’s assets shrink and it cuts its short exposure, and after a day the Dow falls, it adds more.
The prospectuses also say how far the Dow can rise before the money is gone. Each warns that if the Dow approaches a certain gain at any point in a day, you could lose your entire investment, and the gain shrinks as the multiple grows: 100% for DOG, 50% for DXD, 33% for SDOW.
What does one Dow day do to each fund?
Say you want $9,000 of short Dow exposure for one session. You can buy it three ways.
For one day they are interchangeable. The next morning they are not.
After the winning day, the SDOW holder’s exposure has grown by $405 against $135 for DOG, and after a losing day it would have shrunk by the same larger amount, so the higher the multiple, the harder each reset pushes the size of the position around without the holder placing a single order. Over several sessions that resizing compounds. The result can sit well above or well below three times the Dow’s move, depending on the path.
A day-by-day SDOW week works a trending week and a choppy one, and the volatility decay page has the general arithmetic. SDOW frees up $6,000 of cash in the example. That freed cash is the appeal, and it is also what tempts people to hold the fund far longer than one session.
Who does each fund suit?
DOG
DOG is for the investor who owns large US companies and wants to offset part of a decline over days or a few weeks without selling. Buying a share is an ordinary purchase, so the hedge can sit in a cash account or an IRA where short selling is off the table, within whatever limits the broker sets on inverse funds. Its -1x multiple gives the smallest drift of the three. Small is not zero. Set a dollar target for the hedge. Compare the position with it every week, and top up or trim.
DXD
DXD sits in the middle. It suits a trader with a view on the Dow over a day or two, such as around a Federal Reserve decision or a cluster of earnings from the highest-priced members, who wants the move with half the cash DOG would tie up and can accept roughly double DOG’s drift.
SDOW
SDOW is for one watched session. A 4% Dow rally costs it about 12% in a day.
Size it from the dollar loss you can accept if the Dow jumps against you. Then measure how far the Dow usually travels in a session with its average true range, pick a jump several times that size, and check that the position survives it at the loss you named.
What should you check before buying one?
Start with the summary prospectus. Read the objective, then the total-loss sentence under leverage risk. Next, open the holdings tab on the ProShares fund page and see which banks sit on the other side of the swaps. Pull up the Dow’s members ranked by share price, with their earnings dates. Some brokers require an acknowledgment before you can trade leveraged and inverse funds, and some account types restrict them, so confirm both.
The inverse ETF list sets out the other inverse funds by index and multiple, from Treasuries to the Nasdaq-100. To compare paths, the leveraged ETF decay calculator runs any series of Dow moves through each multiple.
Questions traders ask next
Do SDOW, DXD and DOG own the 30 Dow stocks?
No. The short exposure comes from contracts: swaps with banks that pay the fund when the Dow falls, and Dow mini futures. Behind those contracts, the cash is parked in short-term Treasury bills and a ProShares money market fund. The funds own the bills and the cash. They never need to borrow or short a single Dow share.
Why does the Dow sometimes move differently from the S&P 500?
The Dow holds 30 companies and weights them by share price, so the most expensive shares count most. The S&P 500 holds around 500 companies weighted by market value. A big move in one high-priced Dow stock can push the Dow up on a day the broader market barely moves, and a Dow inverse fund follows the Dow.
Is DOG a good hedge for a stock portfolio?
It offsets Dow moves one day at a time, so it fits best when your holdings look like the Dow: large US companies across most industries outside transportation and utilities. A portfolio heavy in small companies or a single sector can fall on days the Dow holds up. Check the hedge's dollar size each week and top it up or trim it.