Investing your money to get exposure to the Australian shares sector has never been easier thanks to ASX ETFs like the SPDR S&P/ASX 200 ETF (ASX: STW). Before you make an investment, we think it’s important to do your own ETF review. So, here are three tips to get the ball rolling.
1. Find out what the STW ETF invests in
The SPDR STW ETF is Australia’s first ETF and has been operating for over 15 years. STW provides exposure to the largest 200 Australian shares, based on market capitalisation. This is a low-cost way to access top Australian companies through a single fund.
2. Has the ETF reached scale?
The SPDR STW ETF had $3614.72 million of money invested when we last pulled the monthly numbers. Given STW’s total funds under management (FUM) figure is over $100 million, the ETF has met our minimum criteria for the total amount of money invested, otherwise known as FUM. We draw the line at $100 million for ETFs in the Australian shares sector because we believe that relative to smaller ETFs, achieving this amount of FUM de-risks the ETF.
3. Watch the fees (and other costs)
SPDR charges investors a yearly management fee of 0.13% for the STW ETF. This means that if you invested $2,000 in STW for a full year, you could expect to pay management fees of around $2.60.
For context, the average management fee (MER) of all ETFs covered by Best ETFs Australia on our complete list of ASX ETFs is 0.51% or around $10.20 per $2,000 invested. Keep in mind, small changes in fees can make a big difference after 10 or 20 years.
Where to from here in 2020?
So there you have it, three tips to weigh up the STW ETF. Before you go any further, take a look at our SPDR STW report – it’s free. Then, to make sure you’ve covered all bases, don’t forget to search our complete list of ASX ETFs to compare your options. You can filter the search results according to sector, issuer, size and more.
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