- Pays: monthly.
- First paid: July 2013 — every payment since is charted below.
- What it is: It buys the stocks in the S&P 500 and writes corresponding at-the-money calls on the index (tracking the Cboe S&P 500 BuyWrite Index), distributing the premium monthly.
- Fee: 0.60% expense ratio (issuer fund page).
- The pedigree: part of Global X's covered-call family alongside QYLD — index-based, rules-driven, with one of the longest payment records in the category.
Index buy-write funds are the category's control group: no single-stock cliff, no leverage, no exotic spreads — just the plain trade of selling an index's upside for monthly premium. Their long records are the base rate everything flashier should be judged against.
XYLD pays monthly. Each point below is one distribution since the fund began paying in July 2013.
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Each point is one payment; the line ends at the most recent payout. The table below totals them by year.
| Recent Ex-Dividend Dates | Distribution / Share |
|---|
"Next expected" is estimated from XYLD's recent payment rhythm — the fund announces exact dates shortly before each payout, and the data feed can lag a few days. You must own shares before the ex-dividend date to receive that payout; the cash typically arrives days later. See every fund's upcoming date on the live dividend calendar.
A real total-return estimate, assuming every payout was reinvested — including what happened to the share price. Before taxes and fees. Past performance does not predict the future.
Before weekly payers, 0DTE spreads, and 100%+ headline yields, there was this: buy an index, write calls on it, pay out the premium monthly. Global X's family — QYLD on the Nasdaq-100, XYLD on the S&P 500, RYLD on the Russell 2000, and the half-covered QYLG — has run the experiment for years across whole market cycles.
That history is the honest yardstick: any newer fund promising more should explain what extra risk pays for it. Overlay XYLD against the flashy end of the category on the compare tool, and check the long-run price side on the Erosion Index.
| Year | Total Distributions / Share | Payments | Change vs Prior Year |
|---|
Data source: Yahoo Finance. Figures are per share; the current year may be partial and figures should be verified against official sources.
Calculated from complete calendar years in the data above. Past results don't guarantee future payments.
When Is XYLD's Next Ex-Dividend Date?
XYLD pays monthly. The exact date of each payout is announced by the fund only shortly beforehand, so no site can promise the next date — but the live schedule box above shows the most recent ex-dividend date and the expected window for the next one, computed from XYLD's actual payment rhythm. Remember: you must own shares before the ex-dividend date to receive that payout.
XYLD's Record So Far
XYLD — the Global X S&P 500 Covered Call ETF — launched in June 2013 and has paid monthly since July 2013. The chart above shows every declared distribution; the year-by-year table totals them.
The Original 20%-Free Trade
XYLD is what covered-call investing looked like before the arms race: full index ownership, at-the-money calls, every month, by rule. Its decade-plus record — through 2020's crash, 2022's bear market, and the melt-ups between — is the closest thing the category has to long-run truth: real income, real upside sacrifice, and a share price that needs the payouts counted to tell the full story.
Reading the Chart Honestly
Systematic buy-write funds pay what volatility offers: richer checks in nervous markets, thinner in calm ones, and a share price that lags the plain index in melt-ups because the rallies were sold in advance. Judge on total return over full cycles — the compare tool overlays XYLD against its plain index in one view.
Compare It Against Anything
Same chart, two tickers, one honest overlay — payouts and price erosion side by side.
Compare Any Two Funds