You just hit 40. You have $60,000 invested in the market, roughly 25 years before you plan to touch it, and a nagging feeling that you’re behind. Truth is, you’re right on the edge of the sweet spot where compounding stops feeling slow and starts feeling rewarding. Three low-cost ETFs can carry most of that weight for you: the Vanguard Mega Cap Growth ETF (NYSEARCA:MGK), the Schwab U.S. Large-Cap Growth ETF (NYSEARCA:SCHG), and the iShares Core MSCI Total International Stock ETF (NASDAQ:IXUS). Together they give you concentrated U.S. growth, broad U.S. growth, and everything outside America, at a blended low cost.
Fidelity’s rule of thumb says you should have about 3x your salary saved by 40. If you’re short of that, the fix is straightforward: cheap, growth-tilted equity exposure and the patience to leave it alone.
Why Compounding Still Has Room to Work
Twenty-five years is long enough that fees, taxes, and small drags compound into real money. That is why the expense ratios on these three matter so much. MGK charges 0.05%, SCHG charges 0.04%, and IXUS charges 0.07%. On a $10,000 position in SCHG, you’re paying about four dollars a year. Every other dollar stays invested and keeps working for you.
MGK: Mega Caps Doing the Heavy Lifting
MGK holds the biggest growth companies in the United States and almost nothing else. That concentration is the point. Over the last decade, the fund has returned 447.88% on a total return basis, and over the last five years, 89.3%. Year to date it’s up 8.49%, with a one-year gain of 17.42%.
The fund’s fact sheet, dated May 20, 2026, confirms an expense ratio of just 0.05%. For a 40-year-old who still needs equity risk, MGK is the purest way to bet that America’s largest growth companies keep leading the next 25 years the way they led the last ten.
SCHG: Broader Growth Exposure at a Tiny Cost
SCHG casts a wider net than MGK. It holds hundreds of U.S. large-cap growth names and has grown into a $61 billion giant. The top of the book is what you’d expect: NVIDIA at 11.01%, Apple at 9.83%, Microsoft at 7.17%, Amazon at 5.67%, and Alphabet, Broadcom, Tesla, and Meta rounding out the top ten.
Ten-year total return sits at 445.23%, with a one-year gain of 17.44% and YTD of 8.95%. Pair SCHG with MGK, and you own the growth story from two angles: mega caps at the core, with more mid-tier growth names in the wings.
IXUS: The Diversifier You Probably Don’t Own
Every U.S. growth fund on your screen looks the same because they essentially hold the same ten companies. IXUS breaks that pattern by owning what the S&P 500 doesn’t. It’s a $56.2 billion fund with roughly 4,198 positions across Canada, Japan, the U.K., Europe, China, India, Latin America, and emerging markets.
And the performance case is finally showing up. IXUS is up 16.27% year to date, 25.59% over the past year, and 147.94% over the past decade. Names like Alibaba, Shopify, Royal Bank of Canada, Unilever, and Spotify give you real exposure to businesses that don’t move in lockstep with U.S. tech.
The Trade-Off You Should Know
It is worth noting that MGK and SCHG overlap heavily. Both lean hard on the same handful of mega-cap growth names, so pairing them concentrates risk more than it diversifies it. If those companies stumble, both funds will likely fall together. IXUS partially offsets that, but international stocks have trailed U.S. growth for most of the last decade, and there is no guarantee they lead from here. A reasonable split for someone in your seat is a heavier weight on the U.S. growth pair and a meaningful but smaller slice in IXUS. You get the compounding engine, you get a hedge, and you’re paying almost nothing in fees to run it. That’s the portfolio your 65-year-old self will thank you for.
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