SPYL vs VUAA — which S&P 500 UCITS ETF for non-US investors?

The two funds, side by side

Fund data from the issuers' own factsheets dated 31 August 2026 — State Street for SPYL, Vanguard for VUAA. Assets, ongoing charges, listings and share classes change; the current factsheet is the authority, not this page. Share class assets are the accumulating line alone; total fund assets include the fund's other share classes, such as each issuer's distributing version.

SPYL was renamed in February 2026 — it was previously published simply as the SPDR S&P 500 UCITS ETF (Acc), and older forum threads still use that name. The ISIN did not change.

Is SPYL better just because its TER is 0.03%?

The fee difference is real, measurable, and smaller than it looks written as a ratio. Four basis points is $4 a year per $10,000, or $40 on $100,000. Over a long holding period compounded against a large balance it is worth having; on a €2,000 monthly contribution it is dominated by almost every other cost in the chain.

More importantly, the ongoing charge is not what leaves your return. It is one input into the number that does.

• The ongoing charge is a published intention. It covers management, administration, audit, depositary and regulatory costs. It is deducted daily from net asset value.
• Tracking difference is the realised outcome. It is the fund's actual return minus the index return, and it nets the fee against everything else — securities lending income, how efficiently the fund recovers withholding tax, dealing costs when the index rebalances, cash drag, and any sampling where full replication is impractical.

A fund can charge less and still deliver less. Comparing ongoing charges tells you what each manager intends to take; comparing tracking difference tells you what each one actually did.

What the tracking difference actually was

This comparison is unusually clean, because both funds report against the same benchmark ticker, and both published a factsheet dated 31 August 2026. The figures below are each issuer's own, net of expenses.

Since-inception figures cover different periods — SPYL launched in October 2023 and VUAA in May 2019 — so those two columns are not comparable with each other. Past performance is not a reliable indicator of future results, and a single twelve-month tracking difference is a measurement, not a trend.

Two things are worth reading out of that table.

The gap between the funds is narrower than the fee gap. Over the one year where both have data, three basis points separated them, against four basis points of fee difference. The cheaper fund did finish ahead — but not by the full amount the fee table implies, which is exactly why the fee table is not the answer on its own.

SPYL has no three- or five-year record. It launched in October 2023. VUAA has tracked through 2022's drawdown and several index rebalances; SPYL has not. Whether that matters is a judgement about how much weight to give a longer sample, not a fact about either fund's quality.

Fund size, liquidity and what they do and do not tell you

On the 31 August 2026 factsheets, VUAA's accumulating share class held about US$35.9bn against SPYL's US$18.8bn; across all share classes the Vanguard fund held about US$89.2bn against State Street's US$43.6bn. Both are large by any ordinary measure, and both figures move continuously — SPYL's has grown quickly since launch, and any number quoted here will be stale before long.

Size is a proxy for two things that matter and one that does not.

• Spread, which matters. A more heavily traded line usually quotes tighter, and the spread is a real cost you pay on the way in and out. It is also specific to the line, not the fund: the same fund can be tight on its primary exchange and wide on a secondary listing in another currency.
• Closure risk, which matters a little. Very small funds get merged or liquidated, which forces a disposal at a time not of your choosing. Neither of these funds is anywhere near that territory.
• Performance, which it does not predict. A bigger fund is not a better tracker. Both of these figures are far past the point where scale still buys efficiency.

For a buy-and-hold investor making periodic purchases, the spread on the specific line your broker routes to is likely to matter more than either fund's total assets.

Trading currency is not currency exposure

This is the point most often got wrong, and it is the same for both funds.

Both have a USD base currency and hold US companies whose shares are priced in dollars. The currency of the exchange line you buy — EUR on Deutsche Börse, GBP on the London Stock Exchange, USD on the SIX — changes the currency you transact in. It does not change what the fund owns. Buying the EUR-quoted line of either fund leaves your economic exposure in US dollars, and a euro investor carries USD/EUR risk in both cases.

What a line in your own currency can save is an explicit FX conversion at your broker, which on some brokers is a meaningful percentage. That is a transaction-cost reason to prefer one line over another, not a risk-management one. Neither share class described on this page is currency hedged; hedged share classes of S&P 500 UCITS ETFs do exist, are a different product with a different cost, and are outside the scope of this comparison.

The same fund, different tickers

Both funds are cross-listed, and neither uses one ticker everywhere. This catches people out when a broker search returns something that looks wrong.

Listings as shown on the 31 August 2026 factsheets. SPYL is also listed on the Bolsa Mexicana de Valores as SPYLN. Issuers add and remove listings; check the current factsheet rather than a search result.

The ISIN is the identifier that does not change by venue: IE000XZSV718 for SPYL, IE00BFMXXD54 for VUAA. If you are comparing quotes across brokers, compare by ISIN and note which currency line you are being shown.

What this comparison does not turn on

On almost every other fund comparison for a non-US investor, the following decide the outcome. Here they are identical on both sides, and it is worth being explicit about that so they can be set aside.

• US dividend withholding at fund level. Both are Irish funds, so both suffer 15% US withholding inside the fund under the US–Ireland treaty, and Ireland withholds nothing from a non-resident holder. Neither has an advantage. Your own residence's treaty rate matters for what happens next, but it applies the same way to both.
• US estate tax. Neither fund is a US-situs asset, so neither carries the exposure a US-domiciled S&P 500 ETF does for a non-US, non-resident estate above the USD 60,000 threshold. That comparison is SPY against the Irish wrappers, not SPYL against VUAA.
• Accumulating versus distributing. Both accumulate. Each issuer also offers a distributing version of the same exposure, so if cash dividends are what you want, that is a different share class rather than a different fund family.
• Availability under PRIIPs. Both publish a Key Information Document, so both are purchasable by EEA and UK retail investors — the constraint that rules out the US-domiciled funds entirely.

Setting those aside is what makes this a narrow comparison. It is also why it resolves to implementation detail rather than to a principle.

Practical reasons people end up with one or the other

Neither fund is the right answer in general, and this page will not tell you which to buy. These are the considerations that tend to decide it in practice:

• Your broker's list. The most common deciding factor is simply which lines are available and commission-free on the platform you already use. A four-basis-point saving does not survive a broker switch undertaken to capture it.
• Which currency line you can reach without an FX conversion. See above — this is a cost question, and on some brokers it is larger than the fee difference.
• Position size and holding period. Four basis points a year compounds usefully on a large, long-held position. On a small position bought monthly, spread and commission dominate.
• How much weight you give a longer record. VUAA has five years of published tracking; SPYL has less than three. Some investors want a fund that has been through a drawdown; others regard the index and the structure as the thing being bought.
• What you already hold. If you own one of them at a gain, switching to capture four basis points a year is usually the wrong trade — a realised capital gain today can take many years to earn back at that rate, depending on your own capital-gains treatment.

Seeing this on your own holdings

The layer this page is about — what the wrapper costs you and what it saves you — is invisible on a brokerage statement. Withholding suffered inside an Irish fund is deducted before the fund is paid, so it never appears on any document you receive, and the tracking difference shows up nowhere except in a NAV you would have to compare against an index yourself. BorderFolio estimates the withholding per instrument, from the domicile of each fund you actually hold against the tax residence you configure, and keeps it attached to your real dividend history rather than to a worked example.

Limitations

• Fund data ages. Ongoing charges, assets, listings and share classes are as published on the issuers' factsheets dated 31 August 2026. The current factsheet is the authority.
• One tracking window is not a trend. Twelve months of tracking difference measures what happened, not what will. It moves with securities lending, index turnover and dealing conditions.
• The two since-inception figures cover different periods and are not comparable with each other.
• Costs outside the fund are not modelled. Spread, commission and FX conversion vary by broker and by line, and on realistic holdings they can exceed the fee difference discussed here.
• The second tax step is residence-specific. How your own country treats an accumulating fund, and whether it grants credit for tax suffered inside it, is not modelled on this page.
• Not advice. This is an informational comparison of two fund structures, not a recommendation to buy, hold or sell either. See the investment & tax disclaimer.

Common questions

Is SPYL better than VUAA just because its TER is 0.03%?

Not automatically. The fee gap is real but small: 0.03% against 0.07% is four basis points, about $4 a year on $10,000. What you actually receive is the tracking difference, which nets the fee against securities lending, withholding recovery, dealing costs and index sampling. Over the twelve months to 31 August 2026, against the same S&P 500 Net Total Return benchmark, SPYL returned 0.16 percentage points above the index and VUAA 0.13 — a gap of three basis points, not four. The fee advantage largely showed up, but it is not the whole number and one twelve-month window is not a pattern.

What is the difference between SPYL and VUAA?

Less than most comparisons. Both are Irish-domiciled UCITS ETFs, both accumulate rather than distribute, both replicate physically, both are USD base currency and both track the same S&P 500 net total return index. The differences are the ongoing charge (0.03% for SPYL, 0.07% for VUAA as published on the 31 August 2026 factsheets), fund size and track record length, and which exchange lines and tickers your broker offers.

Why do SPYL and VUAA both beat the S&P 500 index they track?

Because of the index definition, not skill. Both funds are measured against the S&P 500 Net Total Return index, which Vanguard's factsheet defines as reinvested dividends less 30% withholding tax. An Irish-domiciled fund suffers 15% US withholding on dividends under the US–Ireland treaty, not 30%. That structural gap is worth more than either fund's ongoing charge, so a competently run Irish S&P 500 tracker normally finishes above its own net benchmark. It is the strongest single illustration of why fund domicile matters to a non-US investor.

Which is the cheapest S&P 500 UCITS ETF?

On headline ongoing charge, SPYL at 0.03% is among the cheapest S&P 500 UCITS ETFs available, against 0.07% for both VUAA and the iShares Core S&P 500 UCITS ETF. Cheapest by fee is not the same as cheapest to own: the spread you pay on entry and exit, your broker's commission and any FX conversion can outweigh four basis points a year on a small or frequently traded position.

Do SPYL and VUAA have different US estate tax exposure?

No. Both are Irish-domiciled UCITS funds, so neither is a US-situs asset for US estate tax purposes. That is one of the main reasons non-US investors use either fund instead of a US-domiciled S&P 500 ETF, where US-situs holdings above USD 60,000 can attract US estate tax for a non-US, non-resident estate unless an estate tax treaty raises the threshold. Between these two funds specifically, the estate question is identical and decides nothing.

Does buying the EUR or GBP line change my currency exposure?

No. Both funds have a USD base currency and hold US shares priced in dollars. Trading currency is the currency of the exchange line you buy, not the currency of the assets — buying the EUR-quoted line of either fund leaves your exposure in US dollars. A quoted line in your own currency can still save an explicit FX conversion at your broker, which is a cost question rather than a risk one. Neither share class described here is currency hedged.

Do SPYL and VUAA use the same ticker on every exchange?

No, and this is a practical trap. SPYL trades as SPYL on Deutsche Börse, Euronext Amsterdam, the SIX Swiss Exchange and the London Stock Exchange's USD line — but as SPXL on the London Stock Exchange's GBP line and SP5A on Borsa Italiana. VUAA trades as VUAA on Deutsche Börse, Borsa Italiana and the LSE USD line, and as VUAG on the LSE GBP line. The ISIN is the reliable identifier: IE000XZSV718 for SPYL and IE00BFMXXD54 for VUAA.