KIE vs RSPF

KIEAState Street SPDR S&P Insurance ETF

RSPFCInvesco S&P 500 Equal Weight Financials ETF

In short

KIE Most financial-sector funds are banks with a side of insurance. KIE flips it: roughly 50 insurance stocks and nothing else, running since 2005 at a price below the typical broad-financials fund.

RSPF Most financials funds are really a bet on a few megabanks. RSPF spreads the S&P 500's financial sector evenly across about 80 names, so an insurer or an exchange operator carries the same weight as the biggest bank on the list.

Stated mandate

KIE The fund seeks to track, before fees and expenses, the total return performance of the S&P Insurance Select Industry Index.

RSPF The fund is designed to provide equal-weighted exposure to stocks in the financials sector.

Why people hold it

• KIE 0.35% a year, under the 0.44% median for its financials peer group, and modest for a single-industry slice.
• Trading since 2005, through the financial crisis and every rate cycle since.
• One of the more actively traded funds in its category, which typically shows up as tighter bid-ask spreads for the people buying it.
• Roughly 50 insurance names, few enough to actually read the holdings list, with distributions paid quarterly.ssga.com

• RSPF Equal weight, rebalanced quarterly: winners get trimmed and laggards topped back up, instead of letting the largest banks quietly run the portfolio.invesco.com
• A 0.40% expense ratio, slightly under the typical fund in the financials cohort, for a rules-based tilt rather than a manager's judgment call.
• Sticks closely to the index it names, the S&P 500 Equal Weight Financials, and holds the sector broadly rather than skimming the headline names.
• Trading since 2006, so the equal-weight method has been through the 2008 banking blowup and the 2023 regional bank scare with the same rulebook.

Worth knowing

• KIE Broad financials rivals like XLF and VFH charge closer to 0.08%. The insurance-only focus costs extra.
• One industry, about 50 stocks: catastrophe losses, reserve surprises and rate swings hit the whole basket at once.
• Insurance is a slice of the financial sector, not a stand-in for it. Banks, exchanges and payment networks sit outside this index.ssga.com

• RSPF The tilt costs extra: cap-weighted rivals XLF (0.08%) and VFH (0.09%) charge a fraction of RSPF's 0.40% for plain sector exposure.
• Thinly traded next to the sector's biggest funds, which can mean wider bid-ask spreads, especially on larger orders.
• Equal weighting leaves more room for regional banks and insurers, so results can diverge from the cap-weighted sector in either direction.invesco.com

Full KIE profile⁠

Full RSPF profile⁠