NHYB vs SPHY

NHYBANuveen High Yield Corporate Bond

SPHYAState Street SPDR Portfolio High Yield Bond ETF

In short

NHYB ESG-screened high yield priced like the plain stuff: 0.08% a year, well over a thousand bonds, and the same Bloomberg MSCI index Nuveen's older, pricier ETF follows.

SPHY State Street's junk-bond workhorse: roughly 1,900 US high yield bonds in one wrapper for 0.05% a year, a fraction of what the typical high yield ETF charges, with income paid monthly.

Stated mandate

NHYB The fund seeks to track the Bloomberg MSCI U.S. High Yield Very Liquid ESG Select Index before fees and expenses. Its strategy uses representative sampling and normally invests at least 80% of assets in index components.

SPHY The fund seeks to track, before fees and expenses, the price and yield performance of the ICE BofA US High Yield Index.

Why people hold it

• NHYB Costs 0.08% a year, level with the cheapest broad high-yield ETFs (USHY) and a small fraction of what the typical fund in this cohort charges.
• Nuveen's older ETF on the identical index (NUHY) charges 0.30%. Same benchmark, same rulebook, a fraction of the fee.
• Holds well over a thousand bonds through representative sampling, so a single issuer's trouble is a rounding error, not a headline.
• A multi-billion-dollar fund that has hugged its index closely, and one of the stronger implementations in a crowded high-yield group.

• SPHY 0.05% a year against a peer-group median about eight times higher. In high yield, the fee comes straight out of coupon income, so the gap does real work.
• Holds about 1,900 bonds tracking the ICE BofA US High Yield Index, broad enough that no single issuer's trouble dominates the portfolio.ssga.com
• Live since 2012, a multi-billion-dollar fund that trades actively and has stuck tightly to its stated index rather than drifting from the mandate.
• Distributions arrive monthly, in step with how the underlying coupons come in.

Worth knowing

• NHYB Launched in September 2025, so the live record is short and has not yet been through a full credit cycle.
• This is below-investment-grade debt: prices can fall hard when credit spreads widen, and defaults come with the territory.
• The ESG screen leaves out issuers the broad high-yield market owns, so results can drift from unscreened peers in either direction.

• SPHY This is below-investment-grade credit. Defaults and spread moves drive the price far more than Treasury yields do, and sell-offs in this asset class can be sharp.
• Fees here are already near the floor: SCYB lists 0.03% and HYLB matches at 0.05%, so the cost edge over the strongest peers is narrow.
• Scope is US high yield corporates, full stop. No investment-grade ballast, no emerging market debt, nothing to soften a credit drawdown from inside the fund.ssga.com

Full NHYB profile⁠

Full SPHY profile⁠