ACWI vs SPGM

ACWIBiShares MSCI ACWI ETF

SPGMAState Street SPDR Portfolio MSCI Global Stock Market ETF

In short

ACWI ACWI borrows its name from the benchmark pros use as shorthand for "global stocks": large and mid caps across developed and emerging markets, roughly 2,200 of them, bought in one trade.

SPGM One ticker for the whole investable world. SPGM tracks MSCI's ACWI IMI index, holding roughly 2,900 stocks across developed and emerging markets, and charges 0.09% a year to do it.

Stated mandate

ACWI The fund seeks to track an index of large- and mid-cap equities across developed and emerging markets worldwide.

SPGM The fund seeks to track, before fees and expenses, the total return performance of the MSCI ACWI IMI Index.

Why people hold it

• ACWI One ticker, both halves of the world map: developed and emerging markets, large and mid caps, roughly 2,200 stocks in a single line item.
• Charges 0.32% a year, below the 0.45% median for its index-tracking peer group.
• Trading since 2008 and now a multi-billion-dollar fund that changes hands actively, which shows up in tight, dependable execution.
• Sticks close to the MSCI All Country World Index it quotes, one of the stronger index implementations in its peer group.

• SPGM 0.09% a year, against a 0.45% median for the index-wrapper funds it competes with. That gap compounds quietly in your favor.
• Roughly 2,900 stocks in one line item: US, developed foreign, emerging. No rebalancing between three regional funds, no home-country blind spot.ssga.com
• Pure replication, done tightly: the fund has stuck close to the MSCI ACWI IMI index it promises, one of the cleaner implementations among the index trackers we cover.ssga.com
• Live since 2012 and now a multi-billion-dollar fund, so it is not a launch-year experiment hunting for assets.

Worth knowing

• ACWI Fee is the trade-off: VT runs the same one-ticker global idea at 0.06%.
• The mandate stops at large and mid caps, so the world's smaller companies sit outside the portfolio.
• Emerging-market holdings and foreign currencies come with the package, so returns move with more than just US stocks.

• SPGM Vanguard's VT covers similar all-world ground for 0.06%. Small gap, but real if fee is your only tiebreaker.
• Owning the world means owning its currencies and its emerging markets. Foreign swings show up in your return, unsmoothed.
• Moderately traded rather than a volume monster, so bid-ask spreads can run wider than the busiest global funds.

Full ACWI profile⁠

Full SPGM profile⁠