The portfolios fund charges have been reduced by up to 5.1% on the standard portfolios and by up to 10.4% on the sustainable portfolios. Lower charges equal greater returns over time.
In our January Investment Committee meeting, we discussed the fact that Dimensional, one of the fund managers we use, have not reduced their fund management fees as aggressively as Vanguard who we also use. At that point, we discussed approaching Dimensional and letting them know our thoughts. They have responded with reductions. We don’t for a minute think our feedback was the deciding factor, but the reductions are very welcome.
The fund management charges on the Goodmans portfolios are already very low compared to the charges made by most fund managers. The latest cuts in the Dimensional Short Dated Bond Fund, Emerging Markets Fund and the Sustainable Fund have cut the portfolio costs as follows in Table 1.
Table 1: Reduction in charges
The fund management charges of the sustainable portfolios have now been brought broadly in line with the standard portfolios so in most cases, there isn’t any extra cost for making the choice to invest sustainably.
It should be noted that as funds grow larger the percentage costs tend to fall as the fixed costs of running a fund are spread more widely. The increasing move into sustainable investing is clearly helping to bring down the costs and we would expect this trend to continue.
