CGUI vs VBIL

CGUIBCapital Group Ultra Short Income ETF

VBILAVanguard 0-3 Month Treasury Bill ETF

In short

CGUI Capital Group made its name on active bond and stock pickers, not index trackers. CGUI points that machinery at the dull end of the curve: investment-grade paper, duration held to a year or less, income paid monthly.

VBIL Vanguard's cash-parking ETF: roughly two dozen Treasury bills, none maturing more than three months out, at 0.06% a year. It landed in 2025 and undercut most of the T-bill shelf on price.

Stated mandate

CGUI The fund seeks current income while maintaining an ultra-short duration profile and focusing on capital preservation.

VBIL VBIL seeks to track the performance of a market-weighted Treasury index with an ultra-short-term dollar-weighted average maturity, using a passive approach designed to follow the Bloomberg U.S. Treasury Bills 0-3 Months Index.

Why people hold it

• CGUI The rulebook is tight: an average portfolio duration of one year or less and a dollar-weighted average effective maturity of two years or less under normal conditions.sec.gov
• At 0.18% a year it undercuts the typical cash-alternative fund and matches JPST, the category's most established name, on price.
• Actively run, not an index copy. The 3-month T-bill index is the yardstick, not the shopping list, so managers can pick their spots across short corporate and securitized paper.capitalgroup.com
• Income arrives monthly, spread across a couple hundred short-dated positions, and the fund sits in the upper half of its cash-alternative peer group.

• VBIL It charges 0.06% a year, well under the 0.14% median for 0-1 year Treasury funds and under the category veteran, BIL.
• Plain passive mandate on the Bloomberg U.S. Treasury Bills 0-3 Months Index, tracked very closely. One of the tightest implementations in its peer group.vanguard.com
• Roughly two dozen bills backed by the US Treasury, every one maturing inside three months. Interest goes out monthly.
• A multi-billion-dollar fund with active daily trading, which tends to keep bid-ask costs small.

Worth knowing

• CGUI It is a bond fund, not a money market fund. The share price moves, and on an exchange it can trade above or below the value of what it holds.capitalgroup.com
• Launched in 2024, so the live record is short next to cash funds that have already traded through several rate cycles.
• Cheaper shelf-mates exist: ICSH charges 0.08%, well under half the fee, with a different portfolio behind it.

• VBIL The payout floats with short-term rates. Monthly income rises and falls with what bills yield, and nothing about it is fixed.
• It opened in 2025, so its live record is short next to T-bill funds that have been running for years.
• Stretching maturity gets cheaper: peer XONE targets one-year duration at 0.03%, trading lower cost for more rate sensitivity.

Full CGUI profile⁠

Full VBIL profile⁠