COMB vs PIT

COMBAGraniteShares Bloomberg Commodity Broad Strategy No K-1 ETF

PITCVanEck Commodity Strategy ETF

In short

COMB The cheapest ticket in the K-1-free commodity aisle: 0.25% for a broad basket of energy, metals, grain and livestock futures, wrapped so your tax packet is a Form 1099 instead of a Schedule K-1.

PIT Most broad commodity funds hand the wheel to an index. PIT is VanEck's active take: a compact book of commodity futures where a manager picks the exposures, priced below the typical fund in its group.

Stated mandate

COMB The fund seeks long-term capital appreciation mainly through exposure to commodity futures markets.

PIT The Fund seeks long-term capital appreciation through an actively managed portfolio focused primarily on commodity futures and related commodity instruments.

Why people hold it

• COMB At 0.25%, the lowest fee among the category's top-scoring broad commodity funds (BCI 0.26%, CERY 0.28%, CMDY 0.29%, BCD 0.30%) and below the category median.
• Gains its futures exposure through a wholly owned Cayman subsidiary, so the fund is designed to be taxed like a conventional fund and issue a 1099, not a K-1.sec.gov
• Benchmarked to the Bloomberg Commodity Index: about 30 positions across energy, metals, agriculture and livestock, with index rules capping any commodity group at 33%.bbhub.io
• Live since 2017, long enough to have run through a full commodity boom and bust, and it sits in the top quartile of its peer group.

• PIT Active by design: roughly 30 futures and commodity-linked positions picked by VanEck's team instead of a fixed index recipe, with a stated goal of long-term capital appreciation.
• 0.55% a year sits below the typical broad commodity futures fund, so the active mandate does not carry an active price tag relative to the group.
• Exposure runs through exchange-traded commodity futures and commodity-linked instruments rather than bars in a vault, so there is no physical metal or barrel to store.
• Lands in the upper half of the broad commodity futures basket group on the fundamentals: cost, tradability and structure.

Worth knowing

• COMB Thinly traded next to the category's household names, so spreads can widen. Matters most on bigger orders.
• Returns ride the futures curve, not spot prices. Rolling contracts forward can add to or subtract from the move in a commodity's headline price.graniteshares.com
• Actively managed rather than a strict index clone, with Treasury bills as collateral and cash paid out annually or semiannually, not monthly.graniteshares.com

• PIT Commodity futures swing on weather, supply shocks and the dollar, and there are no stocks or bonds in here to soften a drawdown.
• Index-tracking rivals cost less: BCI at 0.26% and CMDY at 0.29% against 0.55% here. Active management is the thing you are paying the gap for.
• A December 2022 launch with distributions once or twice a year at most: short history, capital-appreciation mandate, not an income stream.

Full COMB profile⁠

Full PIT profile⁠