EVX vs GII

EVXCVanEck Environmental Services ETF

GIIAState Street SPDR S&P Global Infrastructure ETF

In short

EVX Trash is a business, and EVX has been the way to own it since 2006: waste haulers, recyclers, wastewater outfits and environmental consultants, bundled into a compact global portfolio of roughly two dozen names.

GII Toll roads, airports, pipelines and power grids in one ticker. GII has tracked the S&P Global Infrastructure Index since 2007, an early entrant in the category, and charges less than the typical infrastructure fund.

Stated mandate

EVX EVX seeks to track the MarketVector Global Environmental Services Index, which covers companies primarily engaged in environmental consulting, wastewater and drainage, waste management, remediation and protection, non-industrial air filtration, and carbon-capture, waste-to-energy, and biofuel technologies.

GII The fund seeks to track the total return of the S&P Global Infrastructure Index. That index provides exposure to large publicly listed infrastructure companies across transportation, utilities, and energy infrastructure.

Why people hold it

• EVX Running since 2006, long before 'green' became an ETF marketing category. That's a real track record across multiple market cycles in a niche where most rivals arrived a decade later.
• The mandate is specific, not vibes-based: the MarketVector Global Environmental Services Index covers waste management, wastewater and drainage, remediation, air filtration, waste-to-energy and biofuels.
• At 0.55% a year, the fee lands right at the median for its infrastructure-theme peer group. You pay category rates for a far narrower slice of the market.
• Ranks in the upper half of its infrastructure-theme cohort on our review, with no structural red flags in the fund's setup.

• GII Tracks an index of 75 of the largest listed infrastructure companies, screened for float and liquidity, spread across transportation, utilities and energy infrastructure in developed and emerging markets.ssga.com
• 0.40% a year against a 0.55% median for infrastructure ETFs. The cheap end of a category that often is not cheap.
• Live since 2007, so the record covers the financial crisis, a decade of low rates and the 2022 rate shock. It rates among the strongest implementations in its infrastructure peer group.

Worth knowing

• EVX Roughly two dozen holdings means concentration. A stumble at one or two big waste haulers shows up in the fund, with little else to cushion it.
• Thinly traded and mid-sized in assets, so bid-ask spreads can be wider than at the giant infrastructure funds, especially in fast markets.
• Broad infrastructure alternatives cost less: IFRA at 0.30% and IGF at 0.37%. They're wider nets, though, not a pure environmental services play.

• GII IGF follows the same index for 0.37%, three basis points less. GII's own trading is moderate rather than heavy, so spreads count alongside the fee gap.
• Roughly 70 stocks across three sectors and several currencies. A focused, globally scattered book that can behave quite differently from a broad world equity fund.ssga.com
• Distributions arrive on an annual or semiannual schedule, so cash lands in lumps rather than monthly.

Full EVX profile⁠

Full GII profile⁠