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

In the year to Sep 19, 2026, with distributions reinvested, GLD returned +19.5% and TAIL returned −13.3%, so GLD returned more.

Which is cheaper, GLD or TAIL?

GLD charges 0.40% a year and TAIL charges 0.60%, so GLD is cheaper. Fees come from each fund's prospectus.

Are GLD and TAIL the same kind of fund?

No. GLD is a commodity ETF and TAIL is an alternatives 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

GLD vs TAIL: how they differ

Over the year GLD returned more, +19.5% to TAIL's −13.3%, and GLD charges 0.40% to TAIL's 0.60%.

SPDR Gold Shares and Cambria Tail Risk ETF.

GLD and TAIL on the fields both publish, as of Sep 19, 2026. Source: ETFIQ.
	GLD SPDR Gold Shares	TAIL Cambria Tail Risk ETF
Where it sits	Core fund	Alternatives ETF
Issuer	State Street	Cambria
What it is	Holds gold	Hedged equity
Total return, 1 year	+19.5%	−13.3%
S&P 500 over the same days	+16.6%	+16.6%
Gap to the S&P 500	+3.0 pts	−29.9 pts
Expense ratio	0.40%	0.60%
Net assets	$147.8bn	$157m

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.

TAIL in plain words

TAIL is a hedged equity 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 −0.75 with the S&P 500’s and a beta of −0.44, so for each 1% the index moved it moved about 0.44% the other way. The S&P 500 fell in 22 of those 52 weeks, by 1.24% on average. In the same weeks TAIL rose 0.40% on average, a down-week capture of −32.1%. Over the same 52 weeks TAIL returned −13.1% and a Treasury bill fund +3.6%, so it finished 16.8 percentage points behind cash.

Questions people ask

Which returned more over the last year, GLD or TAIL?: In the year to Sep 19, 2026, with distributions reinvested, GLD returned +19.5% and TAIL returned −13.3%, so GLD returned more.
Which is cheaper, GLD or TAIL?: GLD charges 0.40% a year and TAIL charges 0.60%, so GLD is cheaper. Fees come from each fund's prospectus.
Are GLD and TAIL the same kind of fund?: No. GLD is a commodity ETF and TAIL is an alternatives ETF, so they are built for different jobs. The table compares what both publish: return, cost and what each actually holds.

Other comparisons

Where to next

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.

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

A comparison is not a recommendation. Standards and sources