Fund share classes
A fund may offer multiple share classes. The objectives, strategies, and policies for all share classes of a fund are identical. However, expense ratios vary by share class, reflecting the differing costs of providing services to the holders of each share class.
Here are some of the key distinctions:
Investor Shares
Traditional shares for individual investors that typically feature low minimum initial investments.
Admiral™ Shares
A lower-cost share class generally available without a minimum initial investment requirement to institutional investors and financial intermediary clients. Vanguard created Admiral Shares to recognize and encourage the cost savings stemming from large, long-standing investment accounts and to pass these savings on to the shareholders who generate them.
Institutional Shares
Shares generally available to institutions or other investors with fund account balances of $5 million or more.
Institutional Plus Shares
Shares generally available to institutions or other investors with fund account balances from $100 million to $200 million, depending on the fund.
Institutional Select Shares
Shares generally available to large institutional investors. Fund account minimums range from $3 billion to $5 billion, depending on fund.
ETF Shares
Exchange-traded shares of certain Vanguard index funds, ETF Shares combine the benefits of indexing, such as low costs and broad market diversification, with the trading and pricing flexibility of individual stocks.
Vanguard ETF Shares are not redeemable with the issuing Fund other than in very large aggregations worth millions of dollars. Instead, investors must buy and sell Vanguard ETF Shares in the secondary market and hold those shares in a brokerage account. In doing so, the investor may incur brokerage commissions and may pay more than net asset value when buying and receive less than net asset value when selling.
Notes:
All investing is subject to risk, including the possible loss of the money you invest.