Even for financial advisors, the proliferation in recent years of different variable annuity and mutual fund share classes can be overwhelming. Some companies may have as many as 15+ share classes for a single investment strategy, all with unique advisor compensation, surrender charges, and fees. Yet by definition, not all of these share classes can possibly be the best for any particular investor. And in too many cases, it’s simply a matter of the advisor choosing how they wish to get paid.
In this week’s #OfficeHours with @MichaelKitces, my Tuesday 1PM EST broadcast via Periscope, we discuss why there are only a few share classes necessary under a fiduciary rule, and why that means there’s an impending fiduciary armageddon for (most) mutual fund and variable annuity share classes coming soon!
Because the reality is that the differences amongst most share classes ultimately boils down to the different ways that mutual fund companies pay distribution costs – i.e., commissions – across various sales channels. Those who preferred upfront commissions would sell A or B shares, while those who preferred levelized commissions would sell C shares, and those who got paid an advisory fee would charge their 1% AUM fee separately and use institutional or advisory share classes instead. Retirement plans and 529 plans cut their own deals as well, for their own share class alternatives. And the client got whichever share class happened to be sold by the broker or plan they were working with, and paid the associated cost, including embedded commissions, 12b-1 fees, and sub-TA fees, that may or may not apply.
But in a fiduciary world, the advisor is always expected to use the lowest cost share class for the client. Notably, the fiduciary rule doesn’t actually require that advisors use the lowest cost fund, period; it’s a myth that the fiduciary rule requires index funds to the exclusion of actively managed funds. However, if the advisor is going to recommend an actively managed fund… it better be the cheapest version of the fund available, because using anything different would represent a conflict of interest for the advisor enriching themselves at the expense of the client with an unecessarily-more-expensive product.
Yet taken to its logical conclusion, this means that most variable annuity and mutual fund share classes will be rendered entirely irrelevant under DoL fiduciary! At best, there may only be 2 share classes available – the uniform-commission T share for those who are paid some moderate upfront commission, and an institutional or advisory share class for everyone else (who separately charge their own advisory fee on top). And the other dozen or more share classes just vanish!
Of course, the transition may not happen immediately. Not only is there the potential that DoL fiduciary will at least be delayed, but given that it only applies to retirement investors, other share classes may still get used in non-retirement accounts for a while longer. But the key point is that under a fiduciary rule, there is only a legitimate need for one or two share classes at most. As a result, whether it’s the Department of Labor fiduciary rule, or one that the SEC follows with in a few years, what we’ll soon see is an armageddon that destroys most mutual fund and variable annuity share classes, as we complete the shift from being brokers who sell whatever products we can get paid to sell, into advisors who actually sell advice and implement the best solutions we can at the lowest cost they’re available for!
source https://www.kitces.com/blog/variable-annuity-mutual-fund-share-classes-ending-under-dol-fiduciary/
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