MutualFundWire.com: Mutual Fund Fees in Canada Dwarf Those in the U.S.

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Monday, July 15, 2013

Mutual Fund Fees in Canada Dwarf Those in the U.S.

Canada has everything, right? Great maple syrup and good fishing, eh? But it turns out Canada is not the land of plenty in everything, including mutual funds, which are "hosing" their people, Motley Fool's Morgan Housel reports.

The reporter cites Morningstar's managing editor Christian Charest, who said that Canadian mutual funds charge twice what American funds charge.

In 2009, Morningstar put together a report assessing those differences, and found that the typical investor in a Canadian equity fund pays between 2 percent and 2.5 percent while the typical U.S. investor pays less than 1 percent. Assets flow into higher-fee funds because Canadians use financial advisors to help them make decisions, and, for the poor darlings, high fees are all they know.

Jonathan Chevreau, editor of Canada's MoneySense, doesn't have much sympathy for his Canadian brethren:

American investors can find no-load mutual funds with MERs under 0.25%. Canadian investors can't. For this, Canadians have only themselves to blame. We aren't price sensitive. We either don't know what we're paying, or we don't care.