BIL vs CLIP

BILAState Street SPDR Bloomberg 1-3 Month T-Bill ETF

CLIPAGlobal X 1-3 Month T-Bill ETF

In short

BIL The original T-bill ETF, running since 2007: a giant, heavily traded stack of one-to-three-month Treasury bills that pays out monthly. Newer copycats undercut it on fee, but few match its trading footprint.

CLIP Treasury bills, one to three months out, at half the fee of the category's longtime giant. Global X launched CLIP in 2023 as the cheap challenger in the parking-lot corner of the bond market, and it has hugged its index tightly since.

Stated mandate

BIL The fund seeks to track the price and yield performance of the Bloomberg 1-3 Month U.S. Treasury Bill Index before fees and expenses. It provides exposure to publicly issued U.S. Treasury bills with maturities of one to three months.

CLIP CLIP seeks to track, before fees and expenses, the price and yield performance of the Solactive 1-3 month US T-Bill Index. It invests in U.S. government Treasury bills with remaining maturities from one month to under three months.

Why people hold it

• BIL Holds publicly issued US Treasury bills maturing in one to three months, so the credit is the US government and rate sensitivity is measured in weeks, not years.ssga.com
• A straight index job against the Bloomberg 1-3 Month U.S. Treasury Bill Index, tracked closely: no credit tiers, no duration calls, no moving parts to second-guess.
• One of the most actively traded funds in its category, with a multi-billion-dollar asset base behind it, so getting in and out is rarely the hard part.
• Pays monthly and has run this same narrow mandate since 2007, across zero-rate years and high-rate years alike.

• CLIP 0.07% a year, half the 0.14% median for its bill-fund cohort and half what category veteran BIL charges for the same one-to-three-month exposure.
• The mandate fits on one line: US Treasury bills maturing in one month to under three, roughly two dozen of them. Government paper only, no corporate credit slipped in.globalxetfs.com
• Sticks to the Solactive 1-3 month US T-Bill Index about as tightly as anything in its peer group, which is the entire job description for a bill fund.
• Distributes monthly, and it has already gathered billions in assets, so it is no thin-ice launch.

Worth knowing

• BIL The 0.14% fee is the trade-off. Rivals run near-identical bill exposure for less (VBIL at 0.06%, CLIP at 0.07%), and on T-bills the fee is most of the gap.
• Income moves with short-term Treasury rates. The monthly payout is whatever bills are yielding, so it rises and falls with them rather than sitting fixed.
• A few dozen bills, all maturing inside three months. That is a cash parking spot by design, with no mechanism for capital growth.

• CLIP Income comes straight off short-term Treasury rates. Monthly payouts move up and down with those rates rather than sitting at a fixed level.
• It opened in 2023, so the track record is short next to the bill funds it undercuts on fee.
• Volume is respectable, not the deepest in the cohort, and a hair cheaper exists (Vanguard's VBIL at 0.06%). At these fee levels the gap is rounding error.

Full BIL profile⁠

Full CLIP profile⁠