Hidden fund costs
The expenses that reduce a unitholder's result on top of the stated fee: payments to the depositary and registrar, trading inside the fund, and the spread when buying and selling the unit.
How to read the number
There is one way to see them in full — compare the change in the unit's calculated price with the change in a benchmark. The difference absorbs everything that was taken out of the fund's property.
When the metric lies
The costs are charged daily against asset value and appear as a separate line in no investor report. Over a long horizon they are deducted from the base that compounds, not once from the final result.
Also known as: total cost of owning a fund