Goal
I'm looking for a long term investment vehicle outside of a tax-advantaged account. It's possible I'll be making regular contributions using a dollar-dost averaging strategy. I'd also like to know how to best compare similar investment vehicles in the future.
Comparison
After reading an article comparing FZROX to VTI, I realized there's more to comparison than just fees. Things like Index construction, Fee offsets, Tax efficiency, and Trust should also be taken into consideration. I'm sure there are other factors as well. Here's my cursory comparison.
Structure
FNILX is a mutual fund while VOO is an ETF, although I'm unclear as to just how much of a difference this distinction will make with regards to returns considering both attempt to track the S&P 500 (and thus have a similar construction, or so I assume.)
Fees
Fidelity's huge selling point is that FNILX has 0.00% expense ratio (compared to VOO's 0.03% expense ratio.)
Performance and Tax Efficiency
Looking at the Quarter-End Average Annual Total Returns after taxes on distributions, I was startled at the difference between the two. As seen in the following tables, VOO's return was 3.73% while FNILX's was 4.17%. Am I mistakenly comparing apples to oranges here? If not, what factors might contribute to the large difference, and are they good indicators of future performance difference?
Trust
Given how new Fidelity's ZERO funds are, a small concern of mine is that Fidelity will eventually raise fees, while Vanguard has been a reputable leader in low-fee funds.