Back-End Load

A load (fee) paid when you reclaim your shares of a fund. Most funds drop the load in the event that you hold for a predetermined period of time, generally several years.

Features

• A back-end load is a fee paid by investors while selling mutual fund shares, and it is communicated as a percentage of the value of the fund's shares.
• Dissimilar to front-end loads, investors can frequently stay away from back-end load fees by holding the fund for five to a decade.
• In all cases, the load is paid to a financial intermediary and is excluded from a fund's operating expenses.
• Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and no-load mutual funds are widely accessible and don't have back-end loads.