EVHY vs USHY

EVHYBEaton Vance High Yield ETF

USHYAiShares Broad USD High Yield Corporate Bond ETF

In short

EVHY A credit picker's junk bond fund. Eaton Vance's leveraged-credit desk builds the portfolio by hand, the prospectus caps the deepest-distress tier at 10% of net assets, and income goes out monthly. Trading since 2023.

USHY The wide-angle lens on junk bonds: about 1,900 US dollar high yield corporate issues for 0.08% a year, a fifth of what the typical fund in its category charges. Broad, cheap, heavily traded, and it pays monthly.

Stated mandate

EVHY The fund seeks a high level of current income and also pursues growth of income and capital.

USHY The fund seeks to track an index of U.S. dollar-denominated high yield corporate bonds.

Why people hold it

• EVHY Active, but with guardrails written into the prospectus: at least 80% of net assets in high yield, and no more than 10% in bonds rated below B3/B-.eatonvance.com
• Up to 15% of net assets can sit in investment-grade bonds, giving the managers a quality lever most index trackers in this cohort do not have.eatonvance.com
• Pays monthly, and the portfolio has hewed closely to its stated high-yield income mandate rather than drifting.

• USHY Charges 0.08% a year while the median high yield fund in its cohort runs 0.40%. Cheap rent on an expensive-to-run corner of the bond market.
• Holds about 1,900 bonds against the ICE BofA US High Yield Constrained Index: the broad market, not a curated slice of the most liquid names.ishares.com
• A multi-billion-dollar fund and one of the more actively traded in high yield, which tends to keep bid-ask spreads thin even on busy days.
• Pays monthly and has tracked its index tightly since its 2017 launch, one of the closer index matches in its peer group.

Worth knowing

• EVHY At 0.48% a year it costs more than the high yield median, and far more than index rivals like SCYB (0.03%), SPHY (0.05%) and USHY (0.08%). You are paying for the stock-picking.
• Small asset base and light trading volume, so bid-ask spreads can run wider than the giant index funds in this category.
• Below-investment-grade bonds carry real default and liquidity risk, and this fund only launched in 2023, so its record is short.

• USHY High yield means below-investment-grade borrowers. When credit gets stressed this asset class drops with stocks instead of cushioning them.
• Cheaper tickets sit on the same shelf: SCYB at 0.03% and SPHY at 0.05%.
• This is a fund, not a bond ladder. No maturity date hands your principal back; the basket rolls on indefinitely.

Full EVHY profile⁠

Full USHY profile⁠