CSNR vs GNR

CSNRDCohen & Steers Natural Resources Active ETF

GNRAState Street SPDR S&P Global Natural Resources ETF

In short

CSNR A stock-picker's route into commodities: roughly 60 global natural resource companies, chosen by an active manager using top-down and bottom-up work rather than index weight, for 0.50% a year.

GNR Most resource ETFs are energy funds in a hard hat. GNR spreads a global, large-cap lineup across agriculture, energy, and metals and mining, roughly 90 names tracking an S&P natural resources index since 2010.

Stated mandate

CSNR The Fund seeks total return by investing in securities of natural resource companies. Its adviser actively selects investments using top-down and bottom-up analysis.

GNR The fund seeks to provide investment results corresponding generally to the total return performance of the S&P Global Natural Resources Index. It provides exposure to large-cap companies across agriculture, energy, and metals and mining.

Why people hold it

• CSNR Costs 0.50% a year, which undercuts the typical actively managed US equity ETF fee. Cheap is not usually how active resource funds introduce themselves.
• Roughly 60 names, picked globally. The manager can lean into an oil major or a copper miner instead of taking whatever weight an index hands out.
• Owns shares of resource companies, not futures, inside a plain 1940 Act ETF wrapper. Ordinary brokerage tax reporting, with cash paid out quarterly.
• Scores in the upper half of its active-equity peer group on our review, helped by the fee and the clarity of its mandate.

• GNR Three legs, one ticker: crop and fertilizer names, oil and gas, and miners all sit inside the mandate, so no single commodity story runs the whole fund.ssga.com
• Genuinely global, not North America with a passport. Cohort neighbors IGE and NANR chase the same theme inside one region.
• 0.40% a year, right around the middle of its natural resources peer group, for an index fund that has been open since 2010.
• A multi-billion-dollar fund with steady day-to-day trading and one of the stronger builds in its natural resources peer group.

Worth knowing

• CSNR Launched in 2025 with a modest asset base and light trading. Spreads can widen, so the price you see is not always the price you get.
• One slice of the market. Energy, metals and agriculture stocks move with commodity cycles, and those cycles can be brutal on the way down.
• No index to fall back on. Returns hinge on the adviser's calls, and the track record is too short to judge those calls yet.

• GNR Resource equities ride the commodity cycle. When crude and metals roll over, the drillers and miners in here go with them, diversified thirds or not.
• Global reach means overseas listings and foreign currency swings layered on top of the commodity moves.
• Distributions land on an annual or semiannual schedule rather than monthly, so the cash flow is lumpy.

Full CSNR profile⁠

Full GNR profile⁠