Which returned more over the last year, ARB or BND?

In the year to Sep 19, 2026, with distributions reinvested, ARB returned +3.1% and BND returned −0.4%, so ARB returned more.

Which is cheaper, ARB or BND?

ARB charges 0.76% a year and BND charges 0.03%, so BND is cheaper. Fees come from each fund's prospectus.

Are ARB and BND the same kind of fund?

No. ARB is an alternatives ETF and BND is an index ETF, so they are built for different jobs. The table compares what both publish: return, cost and what each actually holds.

Data as of Sep 19, 2026.

ETFIQetfiq.com · independent ETF data

ARB vs BND: how they differ

Over the year ARB returned more, +3.1% to BND's −0.4%, and BND charges 0.03% to ARB's 0.76%.

AltShares Merger Arbitrage ETF and Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF.

ARB and BND on the fields both publish, as of Sep 19, 2026. Source: ETFIQ.
	ARB AltShares Merger Arbitrage ETF	BND Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF
Where it sits	Alternatives ETF	Core fund
Issuer	AltShares	Vanguard
What it is	Event driven	Tracks an index of US aggregate bonds
Total return, 1 year	+3.1%	−0.4%
S&P 500 over the same days	+16.6%	+16.6%
Gap to the S&P 500	−13.5 pts	−17.0 pts
Expense ratio	0.76%	0.03%
Holdings	not filed	16296
Net assets	$103m	$163.3bn

ARB in plain words

ARB is an event driven fund. ETFIQ measures what every alternatives fund is sold on: whether it moves differently from the stock market. Over the year to Sep 18, 2026, its weekly returns had a correlation of +0.04 with the S&P 500’s and a beta of +0.01, so for each 1% the index moved it moved about 0.01% the same way. The S&P 500 fell in 22 of those 52 weeks, by 1.24% on average. In the same weeks ARB rose 0.05% on average, a down-week capture of −4.0%. Over the same 52 weeks ARB returned +3.0% and a Treasury bill fund +3.6%, so it finished 0.6 percentage points behind cash.

BND in plain words

BND tracks an index of US aggregate bonds. Over the year to Sep 18, 2026 it returned −0.4% with distributions reinvested, against +16.6% for the S&P 500 and +21.8% for the Nasdaq-100. The prospectus expense ratio is 0.03% a year. It sat 3.9% below its high of Aug 6, 2020 on Sep 18, 2026.

Questions people ask

Which returned more over the last year, ARB or BND?: In the year to Sep 19, 2026, with distributions reinvested, ARB returned +3.1% and BND returned −0.4%, so ARB returned more.
Which is cheaper, ARB or BND?: ARB charges 0.76% a year and BND charges 0.03%, so BND is cheaper. Fees come from each fund's prospectus.
Are ARB and BND the same kind of fund?: No. ARB is an alternatives ETF and BND is an index ETF, so they are built for different jobs. The table compares what both publish: return, cost and what each actually holds.

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Where these figures came from

ETFIQ links to the documents behind every figure. It is not affiliated with any issuer, and a link is not an endorsement.

ARB against BND, ETFIQ, data as of Sep 19, 2026. Every figure is calculated from a named public source; the method is at etfiq.com/methodology. A comparison is not a recommendation.

Cite this page. ETFIQ, ARB against BND, data as of Sep 19, 2026. https://etfiq.com/compare/any/arb-vs-bnd Free to use with attribution; the underlying files are at Open data.

A comparison is not a recommendation. Standards and sources