How do you find out what the fees on an ETF is?

[pondus]

Hi, I'm looking at some Couch Potato portfolios in Money Sense, and they put the cost of the portfolio beside it. I've gone to sites like Horizon but it seems difficult to find their fees. Any tips on how to get this information?

Thanks,

Pondus

[Cal]

Look on their website. Management Fee. You missed it.

[CanadianCapitalist]

To add to Cal's comment, don't forget that the MERs will often be a little bit more than the management fees quoted. That's because HST and some operating expenses should be added to the management fee to obtain th fund's MER.

Also note that trading commissions are not included in MERs. Trading isn't a significant cost for plain vanilla ETFs but it could be if your ETF does a lot of trading.

[pondus]

To add to Cal's comment, don't forget that the MERs will often be a little bit more than the management fees quoted. That's because HST and some operating expenses should be added to the management fee to obtain th fund's MER.

Also note that trading commissions are not included in MERs. Trading isn't a significant cost for plain vanilla ETFs but it could be if your ETF does a lot of trading.

Interesting. What would be an example of a plain vanilla ETF versus one that does a lot of trading? And how do you know what amount of trading is being done?

[stephenheath]

For Horizons the fee is on each individual funds page, for instance, the main page if you click on HEE is:

Horizons Enhanced Income Energy ETF (HEE) - Overview

Name: Horizons Enhanced Income Energy ETF ("HEE")
Ticker Symbol: HEE:TSX
Investment Manager: Horizons Investment Management Inc.
Distributions: Net call option and dividend income
Distribution Frequency: Monthly
Management Fee: 0.65%
Distribution Tax Treatment: Call option premium as capital gains and dividends as dividend income
Eligibility: RRSP, RRIF, DPSP, RDSP, RESP, TFSA
DRIP Eligible: Yes
PACC and SWP Eligible: Yes

So it's 0.65% on that one.

[leoc2]

Some brokers like Scotia iTRADE offer Commission-Free Online Trading on many ETFs.