You don’t have to read very far into this blog to know I am a strong proponent of investing in Vanguard index funds. Indeed, you’ll find this in the Manifesto:
Vanguard. End of story.
Understandably, this raises some questions. Today let’s look at the four most common:
1. What makes Vanguard so special?
When Jack Bogle founded Vanguard in 1975 he did so with a structure that remains unique in the investment world: Vanguard is client-owned and it is operated at-cost.
Sounds good, but what does it actually mean?
As an investor in Vanguard Funds, your interest and that of Vanguard are precisely the same. The reason is simple. The Vanguard Funds, and by extension the investors in those funds, are the owners of Vanguard.
By way of contrast, every other investment company has two masters to serve: The company owners and the investors in their funds. The needs of each are not always, or even commonly, aligned.
To understand the difference, let’s look at how other investment companies (most companies in fact) are structured. Basically, there are two options:
1. They can be owned privately, as in a family business. Fidelity Investments is an example.
2. They can be publicly traded and owned by shareholders. T. Rowe Price is an example.
In both cases the owners understandably expect a return on their investment. This return comes from the profits each company generates in operating its individual mutual funds. The profits are what’s left over after the costs of operating the funds are accounted for—things like salaries, rent, supplies and the like.
Serving the shareholders in their funds is simply a means to generate this revenue to pay the bills and create the profit that pays the owners. This revenue comes from the operating fees charged to shareholders in each of their individual funds.
When you own a mutual fund through Fidelity or Price or any investment company other than Vanguard, you are paying for both the operational costs of your fund and for a profit that goes to the owners of your fund company.
If I am an owner of Fidelity or Price I want the fees, and resulting profits, to be as large as possible. If I am a shareholder in one of their funds, I want those fees to be as modest as possible. Guess what? The fees are set as high as possible.
Now to be clear, there is nothing inherently wrong with this model. In fact it is the way most companies operate.
When you buy an iPhone built into the price are all the costs of designing, manufacturing, shipping and retailing that phone to you. Along with a profit for the shareholders of Apple. Apple sets the iPhone price as high as possible, consistent with costs, profit expectations and the goal of selling as many as they can make. So, too, with an investment company.
In this example I chose Fidelity and Price not to pick on them. Both are excellent operations with some fine mutual funds on offer. But because they must generate profit for their owners, both are at a distinct cost disadvantage to Vanguard. As are all other investment companies.
Bogle’s brilliance, for us investors, was to shift ownership of his new company to the mutual funds it operates. Since we investors own those funds, through our ownership of shares in them, we in effect own Vanguard.
Any profits generated by the fees we pay would find their way back into our pockets. Since this would be a somewhat silly and roundabout process and, more importantly, since it would potentially be a taxable event, Vanguard was structured to operate “at cost.” That is, with the goal charging only the minimum fees needed to cover the costs of operating the funds.
What does this translate into in the real world?
Such fees are reported as “expense ratios.” The average expense ratio at Vanguard is .20%. The industry average is 1.12%. Now this might not sound like much, but over time the difference is immense and it is one of the key reasons Vanguard enjoys a performance as well as a cost advantage.
With Vanguard, I own my mutual funds and thru them Vanguard itself. My interests and those of Vanguard are precisely the same. This is a rare and beautiful thing, unique in the world of investing.
2. Why are you comfortable having all your assets with one company? Isn’t this what tanked investors with Bernie Madoff?
Because my assets are not invested in Vanguard. They are invested in the Vanguard Mutual Funds and, through those, invested in the individual stocks, bonds and REITS those funds hold. Even if Vanguard were to implode (a vanishingly small possibility), the underlying investments would remain unaffected. They are separate from the Vanguard company. As with all investments, these carry risk, but none of that risk is directly tied to Vanguard.
Now this can start to get very complex and for the very few of you who care, there’s lots of further info you can easily Google. For our purposes here, what’s important to know is:
1. You are not investing in Vanguard; you are investing in one or more of the mutual funds it manages.
2. The Vanguard mutual funds are held as separate entities. Their assets are separate from Vanguard, they each carry their own fraud insurance bonds, each has its own board of directors charged with keeping an eye on things. In a very real sense, each is a separate company operated independently but under the umbrella of Vanguard.
3. No one at Vanguard has access to your money and therefore no one at Vanguard can make off with it.
4. Vanguard is regulated by the SEC.
All of this, by the way, is also true of other mutual fund investment companies, like Fidelity and Price. Those offered in your 401k are, in all likelihood, just fine too. (If you have an employer sponsored retirement plan, like a 401k, that doesn’t offer Vanguard funds by all means invest in it anyway. Especially if any company match contributions are offered. Those are free money and an instant return on your investment.)
It is NOT true however for what are called Private Investment Funds. Those are where you turn your money over directly to an individual or group of individuals to manage and invest. That’s what Madoff was running.
3. What if Vanguard gets nuked?
Ok, let’s be clear. If the world ends tomorrow, everything you have invested in Vanguard (or elsewhere) will go up in smoke. But that’s not gonna happen.
If a giant meteor slams into Earth setting the world on fire followed by a nuclear winter, your investments are toast.
If space aliens arrive and enslave us all, unless you bought human feedlot futures, it’s gonna mess up your portfolio.
If super volcanos or global warming or viruses or an ice age or the reversal of the magnetic poles or AI robots or nanobots or maybe Zombies take us out, investing with Vanguard will be of no help at all.
Relax. It ain’t none of it gonna happen.
But lesser disasters can and do happen. Vanguard is based in Malvern, Pennsylvania. What if, God forbid, Malvern is nuked in a terrorist attack? What about a cyber attack? Hurricane? Pandemic? Power outage?
Every major company and institution is aware of these dangers and each has created a Disaster Recovery Plan. Vanguard has one of the most comprehensive going. The company is spread across multiple locations. Its data is held in multiple and redundant systems. You can check out their plan here: Business Recovery Plan
But, if you are expecting a planet or even just a civilization ending event, Vanguard’s not for you. But then, no investments really are. You’re already stocking your underground shelter with canned goods. Short of that, you can sleep just fine with your assets at Vanguard. I do.
4. Am I on the take?
This blog is such strong a proponent of Vanguard it is reasonable to ask….
“Am I on the take?”
Nope. Vanguard doesn’t know I’m writing this and they are not an advertiser. Nor do they pay me in any fashion whatsoever.
(However, this blog does participate in Google Adsense. It is possible that when they choose the ads that appear, Vanguard’s might be one of them.)
Addendum 1: For my International readers…
With its client centered focus, Vanguard is growing rapidly and now is available in many countries outside the USA. You can check the list out here: Vanguard Global
Addendum 2: Vanguard 2022
Recently Vanguard has been subject to complaints of poor customer service and a clunky website. For my part, the service has always been fine. The website, not so much.
Alan Roth describes my feelings on this exactly…
“I still wish Vanguard would concentrate its resources on fixing broken IT systems that I think are the root of customer service issues rather than launching newer, more expensive funds.”
…and why, like him, I’m not leaving Vanguard
