The world's second biggest mutual fund is actually an ETF, an old-school unit investment trust ETF to be exact.

Eric Balchunas of Bloomberg highlights the rise of the State Street Global Advisors' [profile] gigantic SPDR S&P 500 Trust (SPY). At $200 billion, SPY recently surpassed the former second-biggest mutual fund, the $171-billion Pimco Total Return Fund [profile].

Bloomberg notes that SPY has quadrupled in size in the past 10 years, thanks to $55 billion in returns (110 percent) and about $95 billion in inflows, "at least double that of any other ETF." The article details SPY's popularity across different types of investors, be they institutional or retail, short- or long-term. (Though unlike Pimco Total Return or the number one fund, SPY doesn't have much 401(k) money.) Also discussed is SPY's 1990s era unit investment trust (UIT) structure.

Yet SPY has a ways to go before rivaling the number one fund, the Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund [profile]. That fund holds $321 billion, and another $48 billion in the ETF version of the fund. 

Edited by: Neil Anderson, Managing Editor


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