ISPA is iShares' STOXX Global Select Dividend 100 UCITS ETF: it throws out market cap and instead buys the 100 highest-yielding stocks across developed markets, weights them close to evenly, and pays the income out to you as cash. It's the only pure income fund in Kledon's universe. The honest take: the yield is real, but so is the 0.46% TER and a portfolio that looks nothing like the global market — which is either the point or the problem, depending on what you already own.
What's inside
| Ticker | Name | Weight |
|---|---|---|
| LGEN | Legal & General Group plc | 2.13% |
| 1308 | SITC International Holdings Co | 1.94% |
| AKRBP | Aker BP ASA | 1.92% |
| TEP | Teleperformance SE | 1.92% |
| LIGHT | Signify NV | 1.83% |
There is no megacap anywhere in this table. The top holding, Legal & General, is 2.13%; the entire top ten adds up to under 18% of the fund. Compare that to a market-cap all-world, where the top ten alone clear a quarter of the basket and half of them are US platform tech. ISPA is the opposite by construction: a yield screen pushes out the low-payout growth names and levels the weights, so no single stock dominates.
What it leaves you with is a value-and-income portfolio that is also strikingly un-American. The names at the top are British (Legal & General, Taylor Wimpey, Investec), Dutch (Signify, Aegon), Nordic (Aker BP), French (Teleperformance), Australian (Woodside), and Asian (SITC, WH Group) — energy, financials, insurers, and industrials, not the US-tech complex. Even next to a dividend peer like VHYL, which is still US-heavy at the top, ISPA tilts far harder toward Europe and Asia-Pacific. That geographic skew is the real character of the fund, more than the headline yield.
Costs and structure
The number that should give you pause is the 0.46% TER — high for a passive equity ETF, and well above what a plain market-cap all-world charges. You're paying that premium for the dividend screen, not for stock-picking skill. ISPA replicates its index physically — iShares holds the underlying shares — and, true to its purpose, it distributes the harvested income to holders rather than accumulating it inside the wrapper. It launched in 2009, so it has a long live track record through multiple dividend cycles. The full breakdown is on iShares' product page.
Performance in context
Live data temporarily unavailable for this comparison.
ISPA against VWCE is the trade in one chart. VWCE is the full market-cap FTSE All-World — tech-led, accumulating, growth-oriented. ISPA is a high-yield screen of a similar global universe, weighted flat and skewed to value. When megacap tech leads, which it has for most of the past decade, the market-cap fund pulls away because ISPA deliberately owns none of it. When value, energy, and financials are in favour, ISPA closes the gap and pays you cash along the way. You're swapping a slice of long-run total return for a higher, steadier income stream and a portfolio that zigs when the US-tech index zags.
Who buys it and why
ISPA is for the investor who wants spendable income and genuine diversification away from US tech, and is willing to pay 0.46% and give up some total return to get both. The typical holder is at or near drawdown, or building a deliberately value-tilted income sleeve around a cheaper market-cap core. If you're 25 and reinvesting everything, this is the wrong tool — the fee drag and the distributing structure both work against you, and an accumulating all-world does the compounding job for a fraction of the cost.
Alternatives worth knowing
- VHYL — Vanguard's All-World high-dividend ETF, the other big income name. Cheaper, more US-weighted, and a looser yield screen; we put them head to head in ISPA vs VHYL.
- VWCE — the market-cap all-world ISPA is measured against. Accumulating, tech-tilted, and much cheaper. This is what you buy instead if you're reinvesting and don't need the cash.
- IWDA — iShares Core MSCI World, the developed-markets accumulating workhorse. The growth-oriented, low-cost default that ISPA's income screen deliberately inverts.