

Most of the time, tracking the S&P 500 is going to provide more than satisfactory performance. Yes, most of the portfolio is still big blue chips such as Apple ( AAPL) and Microsoft ( MSFT), but you're getting more size diversification. Its weighting for micro-, small- and mid-cap stocks amounts to 23.2% compared to 12.2% for IVV.

Stock Market ETF ( ITOT, $75.73) will get you exposure to a collection of roughly 3,550 stocks – about seven times the number of stocks you'd own if you were to buy an S&P 500 tracker like the iShares Core S&P 500 ETF ( IVV).īoth cost the same – a tiny 0.03% annual fee – but by tracking the performance of the S&P Total Market Index, and not just the S&P 500, you're giving yourself the foundation upon which to construct a focused portfolio that can stand the test of time.įor example, while the IVV has an average market cap of about $160 billion, ITOT's average is approximately 40% less at $96 billion. Investing in the iShares Core S&P Total U.S. Expenses: 0.03%, or $3 annually for every $10,000 invested.(You can adjust how much you hold of each to fit your goals.) It's also extremely inexpensive, costing just 0.06% annually on average. We've created a mini-portfolio of ETFs, each with a 20% weighting, that results in an 80% equity-20% fixed income blend. Here are the five best iShares ETFs for a core portfolio. And you can cobble just a handful of these iShares ETFs together to create an inexpensive, diversified multi-asset set of holdings.

However, you have to learn how to walk before you run.Īmong those 370-plus products are 25 "Core"-branded ETFs that provide the basic building blocks of an investment portfolio. IShares offers more than 370 ETFs that investors can use to achieve alpha – a return exceeding the major benchmark indices. But a few fund providers have the tools for the job – indeed, several of the best iShares ETFs can be combined to create a basic but comprehensive portfolio. Bank of America estimated at the end of 2019 that ETF assets would grow 25% to about $5.3 trillion by the end of 2020 … and explode to $50 trillion by 2030.Īs more ETFs launch, it has become more difficult for investors to wade through the selection pool to build a fundamentally sound, easy-to-manage portfolio. Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have become an investment juggernaut over the past decade, and they're still growing.
