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

In the year to Sep 19, 2026, with distributions reinvested, ARB returned +3.1% and GLD returned +19.5%, so GLD returned more.

Which is cheaper, ARB or GLD?

ARB charges 0.76% a year and GLD charges 0.40%, so GLD is cheaper. Fees come from each fund's prospectus.

Are ARB and GLD the same kind of fund?

No. ARB is an alternatives ETF and GLD is a commodity 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 GLD: how they differ

Over the year GLD returned more, +19.5% to ARB's +3.1%, and GLD charges 0.40% to ARB's 0.76%.

AltShares Merger Arbitrage ETF and SPDR Gold Shares.

ARB and GLD on the fields both publish, as of Sep 19, 2026. Source: ETFIQ.
	ARB AltShares Merger Arbitrage ETF	GLD SPDR Gold Shares
Where it sits	Alternatives ETF	Core fund
Issuer	AltShares	State Street
What it is	Event driven	Holds gold
Total return, 1 year	+3.1%	+19.5%
S&P 500 over the same days	+16.6%	+16.6%
Gap to the S&P 500	−13.5 pts	+3.0 pts
Expense ratio	0.76%	0.40%
Net assets	$103m	$147.8bn

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.

GLD in plain words

GLD holds gold. Over the year to Sep 18, 2026 it returned +19.5% with distributions reinvested, against +16.6% for the S&P 500 and +21.8% for the Nasdaq-100. The prospectus expense ratio is 0.40% a year. It sat 19.1% below its high of Jan 29, 2026 on Sep 18, 2026.

Questions people ask

Which returned more over the last year, ARB or GLD?: In the year to Sep 19, 2026, with distributions reinvested, ARB returned +3.1% and GLD returned +19.5%, so GLD returned more.
Which is cheaper, ARB or GLD?: ARB charges 0.76% a year and GLD charges 0.40%, so GLD is cheaper. Fees come from each fund's prospectus.
Are ARB and GLD the same kind of fund?: No. ARB is an alternatives ETF and GLD is a commodity ETF, so they are built for different jobs. The table compares what both publish: return, cost and what each actually holds.

Other comparisons

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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 GLD, 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 GLD, data as of Sep 19, 2026. https://etfiq.com/compare/any/arb-vs-gld Free to use with attribution; the underlying files are at Open data.

A comparison is not a recommendation. Standards and sources