Vanguard Short-Term Inflation-Protected Securities ETF (VTIP)

How has VTIP done since 2012?#

From October 2012 to October 2026, VTIP returned about 2.2% a year. The S&P 500 returned about 14.5% a year over the same dates. Say you put in $10,000 at the start. It would have been worth about $13,527 at the end, with every dividend reinvested.

VTIP returns by month and year#

VTIP rose in 108 of its 169 months (64%). Its best month was March 2023, at 2.0%. Its worst was September 2022, at −2.9%.

How risky is VTIP compared with the S&P 500?#

Measured from October 2021 to October 2026, on the days both traded.

• Beta 0.02. When the S&P 500 moved 1% in a day, VTIP tended to move about 0.02%.
• Correlation 0.15. VTIP moved mostly on its own, apart from the S&P 500.
• Up and down months. In months the S&P 500 rose, VTIP rose 14% as much on average. In months it fell, VTIP fell 6% as much.

Is VTIP above its 200-day average?#

VTIP closed 0.4% above its 200-day average on October 16, 2026. A rule that holds VTIP only above that average would hold it today.

What was VTIP’s worst drop?#

A drawdown is how far a fund falls from its last high point. VTIP’s worst fall was −6.3%, from March 5, 2020 to March 18, 2020. It got back to that high on June 5, 2020. On October 16, 2026 it was 0.5% below its highest close.

What does VTIP hold?#

This fund owns US Treasury bonds called TIPS, whose value is adjusted for inflation. All of them are paid back in less than five years. Its price can still go down at times, for example when interest rates rise.

It tracks the Bloomberg U.S. Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities (TIPS) 0-5 Year Index. It had 25 holdings as of September 30, 2026, according to Vanguard.

What is the VTIP expense ratio?#

VTIP charges 0.03% a year. An expense ratio is the yearly fee a fund takes to run itself. On $10,000, a 0.03% fee comes to about $3 a year. Of the 162 ETFs on Tactfolio, 85% charge more.

You never get a bill for it. The fund takes the fee out of its own value a little each day.

Which Tactfolio strategies hold VTIP?#

No classic strategy holds VTIP yet. You can add it to your own rules in the builder and see how they would have done.

How does VTIP compare with similar ETFs?#

Funds that can stand in for VTIP:

• SCHP: Schwab U.S. TIPS ETF, 0.03% a year
• TIP: iShares TIPS Bond ETF, 0.18% a year
• VGIT: Vanguard Intermediate-Term Treasury ETF, 0.03% a year
• IEF: iShares 7-10 Year Treasury Bond ETF, 0.15% a year

See all 8 VTIP alternatives, compared on the same dates as VTIP.

Test VTIP in your own rules#

Tactfolio is a platform where you build rules-based investing strategies, backtest them on decades of real prices, share them, and run them automatically in your own Alpaca account. Open the builder, add VTIP, and see how a rule such as “hold it only above its 200-day average” would have done. Strategies run on daily prices and hold US stocks and ETFs only.

The details#

Prices come from Tactfolio’s stored daily prices for VTIP and SPY. Each close is adjusted for splits, and dividends are reinvested on the day the fund pays them out. CAGR is the steady yearly return that turns the starting value into the ending value. Volatility is the yearly standard deviation of daily returns. Beta and correlation compare daily returns with the S&P 500 over the same dates.

Fund facts come from Vanguard. We checked them on October 17, 2026. Read what a backtest simulates and how to read drawdown and CAGR for more on these measures.