---
title: "Vanguard S&P 500 ETF is a share class of a much larger fund"
url: "https://etf.net/news/vanguard-s-p-500-etf-is-a-share-class-of-a-much-larger-fund-2026-10-10"
published_at: "2026-10-10T20:07:45.742Z"
updated_at: "2026-10-10T20:07:45.742Z"
byline: "ETF.net Research"
---

# Vanguard S&P 500 ETF is a share class of a much larger fund

As of September 30, 2026, the traded shares held $1,032.3 billion of the fund's $1,732.0 billion, and the annual charge is 0.03%.

By ETF.net Research. Published Oct 10, 2026.

Vanguard S&P 500 ETF, VOO, is an exchange-traded class of shares issued by Vanguard 500 Index Fund. On September 30, Vanguard reported **$1,032.3 billion** in those shares, 59.6% of the **$1,732.0 billion** fund.

Vanguard's April 28, 2026 prospectus for the fund says each class has the same investment objective, strategies, and policies. Vanguard describes the ETF shares as an interest in the portfolio that fund holds, so a buyer of the ETF owns the same stocks as a buyer of the mutual fund shares.

The ETF prospectus of that date says an individual investor cannot buy the shares from the fund or sell them back to the fund. Only authorized broker-dealers can do that, at net asset value and in large blocks. Everyone else buys and sells the shares on NYSE Arca.

The fund's April 28 prospectus says a shareholder pays a proportionate share of the fund's operating costs, including transaction costs generated by shareholders in the other classes. It also says different expenses can mean different returns from one class to another.

Vanguard dates the ETF shares to September 7, 2010, and the fund's Investor Shares to August 31, 1976.

The fund seeks to track the S&P 500 Index. The April 28 summary prospectus says the advisor invests "all, or substantially all," of the assets in the index's stocks, each in approximately its index weight. The June 30, 2026 fact sheet calls that a passively managed, full-replication approach, and says the fund stays fully invested.

The expense ratio is **0.03%** of assets a year. The April 28 prospectus splits it into 0.02% for management and 0.01% for other expenses. On $10,000, the charge is $3 a year, and the same filing shows a 0.03% ratio in each of the five years through 2025.

## Five hundred companies, a few of them huge

S&P Dow Jones Indices says the S&P 500 measures the large-cap segment of the U.S. market and is composed of 500 companies. The indices in that family are weighted by float-adjusted market capitalization, the market value of the shares available to trade, so the largest companies count for more.

As of Friday, October 9, the fund held 505 stocks. NVIDIA was 8.1%, Apple 7.0% and Microsoft 5.7%, and those three were 20.8% of the fund.

The ten largest securities were 37.8%. Alphabet is in the portfolio twice, Class A at 3.0% and Class C at 2.4%, or 5.4% for the company.

Chart: Ten names, from **NVIDIA** to Tesla

## The record against the index

Vanguard's month-end figures as of September 30 showed the fund's net asset value return, with dividends reinvested, 0.03 percentage points behind the S&P 500 for the year to date. The fund returned 12.72%. The index returned 12.75%.

The shortfall against the index was **0.04** percentage points a year over one, three, five and ten years, and since the ETF shares started in September 2010. Over ten years the fund averaged 15.29% a year, against 15.33% for the index. From that start, the averages were 14.94% and 14.98%.

In 2022, a down year, Vanguard's figures as of June 30, 2026 show the fund returned -18.15% and the index returned -18.11%.

Net asset value is the value of the fund's holdings per share, after liabilities. The trading price can sit a little above or below it. On Friday, October 9, the shares closed at $715.59, five cents above that day's net asset value of $715.54.

The fund pays a dividend four times a year. The latest was $1.8226 a share on September 30, after $1.9622 in June. The last four payments totaled $7.4282 a share, which is 1.04% of the October 9 closing price.

## Four ways to own the same stocks

Three other large funds track the same index.

Table: Fund, Annual expense ratio

On $10,000, that is $2 a year for SPYM, $3 for VOO and IVV, and $9.45 for SPY. Vanguard's figure is from the April 28 prospectus. iShares states 0.03% in its prospectus. State Street states 0.02% and 0.0945% on its fund pages.

SPY is a unit investment trust. State Street's semi-annual report for the half-year ended March 31, 2026 says the trust was created under New York law so an investor could buy a security representing a proportionate undivided interest in the portfolio, a slice of substantially all of the index stocks, held in substantially the same weights. State Street dates the trust to January 22, 1993.

iShares reported $891.8 billion in IVV as of Thursday, October 8. State Street reported $817.2 billion in SPY and $178.5 billion in SPYM that day.

Under etf.net's grading method, VOO is graded an A and ranks third of 14 in the category labeled S&P 500. The grade compares a fund only with others making a similar promise. That category also includes funds that weight the companies differently, among them one that weights each company equally and one that caps any company at 3%.

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