GLD vs SGOL

GLDBSPDR Gold Shares

SGOLBabrdn Physical Gold Shares ETF

In short

GLD Gold in a brokerage account, running since 2004: a trust that holds physical bullion and trades like a stock. It's the heavyweight of the gold shelf, and the fee is the price of that depth.

SGOL A 2009-vintage trust that owns actual gold bars and does exactly one job: track bullion's price after a 0.17% fee. Middle of the pack on cost, front of the pack on doing what the prospectus says.

Stated mandate

GLD GLD seeks to have its shares track the price of gold bullion after the Trust’s operating expenses.

SGOL The Trust seeks to track the price of physical gold bullion, after deducting its expenses.

Why people hold it

• GLD Does the one job it advertises: shares track the price of gold bullion after the trust's expenses, and the tracking is among the tightest in the gold group.
• Huge and very actively traded, which is why spreads tend to be thin and large orders usually find the other side quickly.
• Plain structure: a grantor trust holding physical gold. No futures, no roll schedule, no leverage between you and the metal.
• Trading since 2004, one of the longest-running gold vehicles on the US market and through several gold cycles.

• SGOL Plain plumbing: a grantor trust holding physical bullion, with one job written into its own documents, to track the price of gold after deducting expenses.
• Tracks the metal about as closely as the wrapper allows, one of the cleanest mandate implementations among physical gold funds.
• Trading since 2009, through several full gold cycles, and now a multi-billion-dollar fund that changes hands actively.

Worth knowing

• GLD 0.40% a year is the toll for that liquidity: more than double the typical physical-gold ETF fee, and above its own cheaper sibling GLDM at 0.10%.
• No dividends or interest. Bullion pays nothing, so the gold price minus the trust's expenses is the entire story.
• Gold moves in big swings, with no earnings or yield underneath to soften them.

• SGOL Cost sits at the category median: 0.17% a year, while IAUM (0.09%) and GLDM (0.10%) charge less to hold the same metal.
• Bullion throws off no income. This is a price-of-gold holding, not a cash-flow one, and the fee comes out of trust assets.
• One metal, no diversification. The shares go where gold goes, including the long flat stretches and sharp drawdowns.

Full GLD profile⁠

Full SGOL profile⁠