I’m considering swapping my ISA to Freetrade but I would have to swap my mutual funds to ETFs. I was just wondering what everyone thinks about the pros and cons of each/ is there much difference?
Assuming you have the equivalent ETF to the mutual funds (so the composition and TER is the same) and the trading costs are the same (free) then main relevant points are:
Trading throughout the day
ETFs trade throughout the day (market hours) with prices regularly updating while mutual funds are typically only priced and traded once per day. This is generally a positive but it might promote more regular trading (which is typically detrimental to long term returns)
Jack Bogle talks briefly about this in this video (link to relevant timestamp)
Units
ETFs have to be bought in distinct chunks (unless fractional shares are available, which they aren’t for the UK on Freetrade) while mutual funds are typically fractional by default so you can invest an exact amount without rounding to a number of shares.
This probably doesn’t matter if your investment is relatively large.
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Thanks! I think for me there’s probably no difference but I just wanted to check I wasn’t missing anything
QUESTION TO FREETRADE COMMUNITY
Mutual Funds & Trusts
Can you buy front end load funds in the UK? A fee on purchase with low to zero ongoing fees? Question also applies to Trust Funds.