CNDX tracks the Nasdaq 100; SMH tracks 25 pure-play semiconductor stocks. Both are satellite tilts, not cores — but if you're choosing one as your tech overweight, CNDX is the right call for most people: it already owns the chip leaders alongside the rest of big tech, where SMH strips out everything that isn't a chip company.
What they share
Both are Irish-domiciled UCITS ETFs that fully replicate their index — CNDX from iShares, SMH from VanEck — holding their constituents directly rather than through a swap. Both accumulate dividends inside the wrapper, so there's nothing to reinvest and no tax event until you sell. Both hold US-listed stocks priced in dollars, unhedged, so your real currency exposure is effectively 100% USD whichever you pick. And both do the same job in a portfolio: they're satellites you bolt onto a broad core to overweight tech, never the foundation you build on.
Where they differ
Start with fees, then forget them. CNDX charges 0.30%; SMH charges 0.35% — €150 versus €175 a year on a €50k position. The €25 gap is real but trivial next to what you're actually choosing between, and for once it points the narrow way: the broader fund is the cheaper one. (VanEck publishes SMH's full cost and holdings breakdown on its fund page.)
The decision is what each index actually holds. The Nasdaq 100 is the 100 largest non-financial companies on the Nasdaq — megacap tech, yes, but the top of the fund is mostly software, internet, and consumer: Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Tesla, Meta, Walmart, Alphabet. Semiconductors are a slice of CNDX, not the point of it; the only chip names in its top ten are NVIDIA (8.7%) and Broadcom (3.0%). SMH is the inverse — the MarketVector US Listed Semiconductor index, 25 pure-play chip companies and nothing else, capped at 10% a name so no single stock runs away. NVIDIA and Broadcom sit in both funds, but in SMH they're 9.9% and 9.6%, alongside Taiwan Semiconductor and ASML at roughly 10% each and the equipment makers — Applied Materials, Lam Research — that CNDX barely touches.
So the real overlap between these two funds is two names. Everything else is a different bet, and the concentration cuts opposite ways:
| Ticker | Name | Weight |
|---|---|---|
| NVDA | NVIDIA Corp | 8.69% |
| AAPL | Apple Inc | 7.64% |
| MSFT | Microsoft Corp | 5.63% |
| AMZN | Amazon.com Inc | 4.58% |
| TSLA | Tesla Inc | 3.80% |
| Ticker | Name | Weight |
|---|---|---|
| TSM | Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd | 10.09% |
| ASML | ASML Holding NV | 10.08% |
| NVDA | NVIDIA Corp. | 9.92% |
| AVGO | Broadcom Inc. | 9.59% |
| MU | Micron Technology | 8.29% |
CNDX's top ten is 46.9% of a 100-stock portfolio — concentrated for an index fund, but there are 90 more names underneath. SMH's top ten is 78% of just 25 stocks: there is no broad tail, and the four names pinned to the cap — Taiwan Semiconductor, ASML, NVIDIA, Broadcom — are nearly 40% of the fund between them. CNDX is a concentrated bet on big tech; SMH is a far more concentrated bet on one industry inside it.
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Over any given year one of these will have crushed the other, and which one flips with the chip cycle. Read the chart for what actually happened — but don't assume the leader repeats: semiconductors are famously cyclical, and a year of SMH outrunning CNDX is often followed by the reverse.
Who each one is for
Buy CNDX if you want a tech tilt and you're not dogmatic about semiconductors specifically. It's the broader, slightly cheaper instrument, it already holds NVIDIA and Broadcom at meaningful weight, and bolted onto an S&P 500 or all-world core it does the straightforward thing: more big tech, less of everything else. For most people asking "how do I overweight tech," this is the answer.
Buy SMH only if your conviction is the chip supply chain itself — the foundries, designers, and equipment makers — and not big tech in general. You're paying 0.35% for 25 names and real cyclical whiplash: when semis lead, SMH leaves CNDX behind; when the cycle turns, it falls harder. That only makes sense if you specifically believe semiconductors compound faster than the megacap-tech basket that already contains them.
What you don't do is hold both on top of the same core. CNDX already owns the chip leaders, so stacking SMH on top of it mostly triples down on NVIDIA and Broadcom — the opposite of the diversification a satellite is meant to add. Pick the tilt that matches your actual conviction: big tech broadly, or chips specifically. (If you're still deciding whether a tech tilt belongs in the portfolio at all, CNDX vs VUAA is the more fundamental question.)