Gold Investors Just Got a New Income Opportunity

Investing in gold mining companies is a way to gain exposure to gold’s value. Mining stocks are viewed as a leveraged bet on gold, since the cost to produce an ounce is relatively fixed, so any gains in gold fall to the mining company’s bottom line.

The VanEck Gold Miners ETF (GDX) is a popular way to gain exposure to gold mining stocks. GDX has a $28 billion market cap. The fund invests in the largest mining and gold royalty companies, with 52 holdings in the portfolio.

Two ETF companies offer income-focused ETFs that use GDX as the underlying asset. These funds aim to deliver attractive yields while participating in GDX’s gains (or losses). Each takes a different approach to achieving those goals.    

The YieldMax Gold Miners Option Income Strategy ETF (GDXY) launched on May 20, 2024—happy belated birthday to the fund! GDXY employs a synthetic long position (buy calls and sell puts with the same strike price and expiration date) to gain exposure to GDX. Call spreads are sold to generate cash flow to pay distributions. GDXY pays weekly dividends and has a current distribution yield of 47.66%. The fund posted a one-year return of 41.95% (as of April 30) and has generated an average annualized return of 27.8% since it launched.

The Roundhill Gold Miners Weekly Pay ETF (GDXW) came to market on October 30, 2025. This fund uses weekly swap contracts to generate weekly distributions and returns equal to 120% of GDX’s calendar-week return. The GDXW’s weekly dividends yield 70.25%. GDXW has had an annualized return since inception through March 31 of 31.41%.

The share prices of these two ETFs will mirror what happens with GDX. The VanEck fund peaked in early March and is down 25% since then.

GDXW is a relatively new ETF, so it doesn’t have much of a track record. I will close with a chart comparing the total returns since GDXW launched. It is the winner so far, but I will continue to monitor both ETFs.