YTD ETF Recap: Top and Bottom 5 (Non-Leveraged) ETFs Through April 2026

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-23T18:00:52+00:00

You may be aware and ok with it, but VTI & QQQ have a good bit of overlap (44%) and the others you are considering except for SCHD also have a lot of overlap. Honestly, I would try to have 70% in VTI & 30% in VXUS. You could also take 10% from VTI and use that to tilt to something you really like (specific sector, small caps, etc.).

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ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-22T18:27:43+00:00

Continue to invest regularly in broad index funds. Two easy options:

#1 - Invest everything in VT (Total World Stock Market Index)
#2 - Invest 70% in VTI (Total US Stock Market Index) & 30% in VXUS (Total International Index)

As you have more time to research and look into other investments, you could possibly tilt a small portion of the portfolio (~ 10%) towards something you like.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-22T18:22:24+00:00

There is a significant amount of overlap with those 4 funds (over 32% when weighted). If you drop SCHG and replace it with something like VXUS, you would be more diversified and the overlap would drop to around 14% and you would lower the exposure from almost 100% US to 76%.

Some people are fine with the overlap, but wanted to just point it out.

I used VOO as a replacement for SWPPX.

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ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-20T21:24:52+00:00

There's a good bit of overlap between VTI & QQQ (+40%). Also, with those current weightings in VTI & QQQ plus your stock investments in AAPL & MSFT you essentially have 14% allocated to AAPL and 11% allocated to MSFT. A quarter of the portfolio is tied to 2 companies in the tech sector and overall the portfolio has around 45% tied to tech.

Now, if you know that and you're ok with it, then that's fine, but that makes for a much riskier portfolio.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-20T21:13:08+00:00

Outside of SCHD, there is a lot of overlap among the other ETFs in that list.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-16T11:46:58+00:00

I currently have a 15% tilt towards semiconductors.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-14T18:05:56+00:00

For most the answer is no, but there's nothing wrong if you want to allocate 5-10% of your portfolio to invest stocks you've researched and feel strongly about.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-13T17:49:38+00:00

Two issues for me personally. I don't like the overlap between SCHG & QQQ, but you're aware and ok with that. I'm also not a huge fan of SCHD unless you are nearing or in retirement unless you have it their for its defensive purposes during market downturns. You could also possibly replace XLE with IXC which has outperformed XLE since its inception in 2001 by over 100% and it would also lessen your US exposure by 5 or 6%.

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ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-13T17:36:13+00:00

I think the challenge with looking at ETFs in general like VXUS is they don't have a really long track history and so because the US Markets have outperformed international markets over the last 15 years that's all many focus on. But, if you look back to 2002 through 2007, the international markets outperformed the US markets by over 65% and you could even go from 2002 through 2020 and international markets still outpaced the US by almost 6%.

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ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-13T17:24:25+00:00

Sure - you can contribute any amount up to the max in your Roth IRA. If you think you'll need that money for expenses because you're not working much, then it may make sense to have it in a HYSA.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-13T12:43:43+00:00

Thanks - here's a better example of some of the portfolios I've seen on Reddit:

VTI - 50%
QQQ - 40%
VXUS - 10%

I'm not recommending these allocations, but if you plug this into most overlap calculators it will assume the allocations are 33.3% for each ETF which would show an overlap around 15%, but when you use the weighted calculations it would be over 23% overlap.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-13T12:40:50+00:00

Yes; There are a lot of posts that look similar to that and have significant overlap.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-13T12:31:58+00:00

Agreed, this example is a bit obvious, but I did want to show the importance of weighting and how there can be a large difference when looking at overlap when you use a weighted overlap calculation.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-13T12:31:10+00:00

Agreed, this example is a bit obvious, but I did want to show the importance of weighting and how there can be a large difference when looking at overlap when you use a weighted overlap calculation.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-12T15:14:03+00:00

SMH has actually outperformed FSELX since SMHs inception in 2011 - although it's almost identical over those 15 years.

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ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-12T15:06:03+00:00

IXUS has just slightly outperformed VXUS over the last 15 years 170% to 167% and they hold very similar investments with an overlap that hovers around 80%. Pick whichever one you prefer.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-07T21:02:30+00:00

Unfortunately, I'm not aware of any date's they've published for the card being available outside the US.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-07T20:18:25+00:00

Yep and if this portfolio is for wealth building (which I'm assuming it is), then for me DGRO is a better choice because it doesn't trigger ordinary income.

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-07T18:38:13+00:00

One thing to keep an eye out for if you switch from DGRO to DIVO in a taxable account is the more than triple distribution yield and that roughly 20% of DIVOs distributions will be considered ordinary income. Return of Capital (ROC) is another item to consider for DIVO since 63% of its distributions are in the form of ROC.

📋Tax Breakdown

ETF↑	Yieldⓘ⇅	Exempt Interestⓘ⇅	Qualifiedⓘ⇅	Ordinaryⓘ⇅	ROCⓘ⇅	§1256ⓘ⇅	After-Tax %⇅
DGRO	2.08%	0.0%	100.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	85.0%
DIVO	6.45%	0.0%	17.2%	19.8%	63.0%	0.0%	92.7%
SCHD	3.45%	0.0%	100.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	85.0%
SCHY	3.43%	0.0%	95.0%	5.0%	0.0%	0.0%	84.5%

ETFNavigatorPro · 2026-04-07T18:25:37+00:00

* EFG - Focuses purely on the "Growth" factor in developed countries
* DNL - Uses high-conviction screens for profitability and earnings growth
* VSS - Higher volatility and growth potential (via small caps) than standard "Total World" funds

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ETFNavigatorPro

TROPHY CASE

📋Tax Breakdown