SPLB vs ZTEN

SPLBAState Street SPDR Portfolio Long Term Corporate Bond ETF

ZTENBF/M 10-Year Investment Grade Corporate Bond Etf

In short

SPLB SPLB owns the long end of the corporate bond market, investment-grade debt maturing in 10 years or more, for four basis points a year. Maximum duration exposure at a near-free price.

ZTEN Most corporate bond funds smear across a maturity range. ZTEN parks on one point of the curve: investment-grade corporates with roughly nine and a half to ten and a half years left, held in even slices and refreshed monthly.

Stated mandate

SPLB The fund seeks to track the Bloomberg U.S. Long Term Corporate Bond Index, which represents U.S. corporate bonds with maturities of at least 10 years.

ZTEN The fund seeks to track, before fees and expenses, the price and yield performance of the ICE 10-Year US Target Maturity Corporate Index.

Why people hold it

• SPLB Charges 0.04% a year, far under the typical investment-grade corporate bond ETF.
• Roughly 2,900 bonds tracking the Bloomberg U.S. Long Term Corporate Bond Index, so no single issuer steers the fund.ssga.com
• Coupons pass through monthly, and the fund has been running since 2009 with steady trading volume behind it.
• Tracks its index tightly and ranks among the stronger builds in the investment-grade corporate group.

• ZTEN Precision instead of a range: it targets bonds within about six months either side of the 10-year mark, so the exposure stays a 10-year exposure rather than drifting shorter.fminvest.com
• Even weighting across holdings, which keeps the biggest serial borrowers from swallowing the portfolio the way they can in size-weighted corporate indexes.fminvest.com
• 0.15% a year, below the typical investment-grade corporate ETF fee, with income paid monthly.
• Roughly 300 developed-market investment-grade bonds under the hood, so any single issuer stumble lands as a small slice, not a headline.

Worth knowing

• SPLB Ten-year-plus maturities swing hard when rates move. Intermediate SPIB or short-dated IGSB cover the same credit with far less rate sensitivity.
• Pure corporate credit, no Treasury ballast, so prices fall when spreads widen.
• US issuers only. No overseas corporate exposure here.

• ZTEN The broad index giants cost a fraction of this. VCIT and IGIB run in the low single-digit basis points, but they spread across a maturity band instead of one target year.
• Launched in 2024, still a small fund and thinly traded, so spreads can be wider than in the mega-funds and hurried orders can print away from fair value.
• Ten-year paper swings more with rates than short-dated corporate funds like IGSB. That is the price of sitting further out on the curve.

Full SPLB profile⁠

Full ZTEN profile⁠