Mutual Funds

There are three taxable events with a mutual fund: (1) sale of securities within the portfolio, (2) the declaration and payment of dividends and/or interest from the portfolio’s securities, and (3) sale of mutual fund shares. Your clients cannot control whether or not a fund is going to sell one or more securities for a profit or loss. Similarly, they cannot stop the payment of dividends and/or interest. The third event is the only one controllable by the shareholder.

A mutual fund’s total costs are measured differently, depending upon the study or expert cited. For example, Kopcke reviewed the 100 largest domestic stock funds owned by defined contribution plans. Kopcke found trading costs averaged 0.11% of assets annually in the quintile with the lowest costs and 1.99% of assets in the quintile with the highest cost, with a median of 0.66%.