By Michael Williams
Publication Date: 2026-03-30 16:20:00
iShares Top 20 U.S. Stocks ETF (NYSEARCA:TOPT) is down 11.06% year-to-date, and that slide traces directly back to the fund’s defining feature: a portfolio so concentrated in a handful of mega-cap technology names that a bad stretch for those stocks is, by definition, a bad stretch for the fund.
TOPT tracks the S&P 500 Top 20 Select Index, holding exactly 20 U.S. companies ranked by market capitalization. The appeal is straightforward: own only the largest, most dominant businesses in the country and let scale do the work. Since its October 23, 2024 inception, the fund has attracted $473 million in assets and charges a lean 0.20% expense ratio. For investors who believe the biggest companies keep winning, TOPT offers a clean, low-cost vehicle to make that bet.
The problem is that “20 largest companies” does not mean “20 diversified companies.” The portfolio is built almost entirely around technology and technology-adjacent businesses, and three stocks alone carry the weight of nearly half the fund.
TOPT’s top three holdings, NVIDIA, Apple, and Microsoft, represent a combined 40.36% of the portfolio. NVIDIA alone accounts for 16.1%. Zoom out and the picture sharpens: 46% of the fund sits in Information Technology, with no exposure to Industrials, Materials, Utilities, or Real Estate.
This is not theoretical. NVIDIA has fallen 14.33% over the past month and is down 10.17% year-to-date. Because NVIDIA represents roughly one-sixth of TOPT’s entire…
