iShares $ Short Duration Corp Bond UCITS ETF

What this fund is

iShares $ Short Duration Corp Bond UCITS ETF is an exchange-traded fund (ETF) from iShares, traded under the ticker IGSD (ISIN IE00BCRY5Y77). In a single purchase you get a diversified basket of holdings rather than a stake in just one business. In plain terms it is about lending to governments and companies in return for regular interest, which tends to be steadier than shares but grows more slowly, spread across its target market. Its largest holdings include BLK ICS USD LEAF AGENCY DIST, T-MOBILE USA INC and BANK OF AMERICA CORP. Spread across roughly 3074 holdings (the ten largest ≈ 2.6%), no one position makes or breaks the fund.

By geography it is weighted towards ~80.9% United States, ~5.3% United Kingdom and ~4.5% Canada. By industry it concentrates most in ~38.4% Financials and ~13.7% Consumer Staples. Funds like this are often used as the steadier, lower-swing part of a portfolio — the ballast that cushions the ups and downs of shares. Its ongoing charge (TER) is 0.2% a year — about €20 a year on a €10,000 holding, taken automatically from the fund. It is a distributing share class — dividends are paid to you as cash rather than reinvested, and over the last year it paid out roughly 4.4% (its trailing yield).

It holds the underlying investments directly (physical replication); it is domiciled in Ireland and UCITS-regulated, a European standard built to protect everyday investors and trades in USD. Its price has swung about 4.1% over the past year, which describes how much its price tends to move rather than whether it is good. It launched in 2013. As with any investment, its value can go down as well as up, and past performance is not a guide to future results. (Fund data sourced from iShares.)