S&P 500 ETF Assets Top $1 Trillion for First Time, Vanguard VOO Sets Global Record

TradingKey - On June 3, Eastern Time, the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF, an exchange-traded fund under Vanguard that tracks the S&P 500 Index ( VOO ), saw its assets under management surpass $1 trillion, becoming the world's first ETF to reach the trillion-dollar milestone and setting a new record for the passive investment industry.

[Source: TradingKey]

The ETF's expense ratio is 0.03%, significantly lower than its peers. The AI investment boom in the U.S. stock market and the continuous shift of global capital toward low-cost passive products are the core reasons for the substantial growth in VOO's size.

Launched in 2010, VOO is Vanguard's core broad-based ETF. Morningstar data shows that the ETF saw net inflows of over $69 billion in the first five months of this year, setting a historical record for a single ETF product.

Analysts pointed out that as the S&P 500 Index shortens the waiting period for new stock inclusion from 12 months to 6 months and Nasdaq implements new rules for fast-track IPO inclusion, massive passive capital will be directionally allocated to upcoming high-profile targets, including SpaceX and Anthropic. Once these two companies complete their IPOs and are quickly included in mainstream indices, trillion-dollar passive funds represented by VOO will increase their holdings in accordance with regulations, bringing significant incremental buying interest.

A Bloomberg Intelligence ETF analyst stated: 'In the past, a stock had to wait a year to enter the S&P 500, causing many passive funds to miss out on early gains. Under the new rules, star companies like SpaceX can receive index fund allocations in as little as six months once they go public.'

Founded by John Bogle in 1975, Vanguard employs a unique mutual ownership structure where fund holders are the company's shareholders, and profits are returned to investors in the form of lower expense ratios.

As of the end of the first quarter of 2026, Vanguard's global assets under management were approximately $12.32 trillion. The company has reshaped the global fund industry with its low-cost index investing and is known as one of the 'Big Three' U.S. asset managers, alongside BlackRock and State Street.