Charles Schwab Mutual Funds (Large Cap, NTF, No-Load) (2022) (2022)

Overview of Mutual Funds at Charles Schwab

Charles Schwab is a discount broker-dealer that supports both DIY (do-it-yourself) investors and those who’d like to work with financial advisors. They have their own set of equity and bond mutual funds that are based either on indexes or actively managed. With more than $3.7 trillion held in assets, Schwab is one of the biggest mutual fund providers. Read on to learn about mutual fund pricing and selection with Schwab.

Mutual fund pricing

Mutual funds have various costs that are important to consider: Operating Expense Ratio (OER), Load, and Transaction Fee.

OER – These are charged annually by the fund company to cover management and other costs. Passively managed funds from Schwab range from 0.02% to 0.39% while actively managed funds from Schwab can range from 0.22% to 1.92%.

Load – When you purchase or redeem shares in “load-based” mutual funds, some funds will charge you a one-time commission to compensate the broker for the sale. Schwab funds are generally no-load.

Transaction fee – Brokerage companies sometimes charge a trading fee for the purchasing or redeeming of a mutual fund. Schwab, however, typically charges no fees.

All in all, Schwab offers more than 3,000 mutual funds with no load and transaction fees. In contrast, Firstrade offers over 10,000 mutual funds with no load and transaction fees.

Finding funds at Schwab

Schwab offers a lot of resources to help you learn about and research mutual funds.

With the mutual fund finder, you can find and compare mutual funds on your own. With the “Build a portfolio” tool, you can simplify the process of identifying funds that meet with your own investment goals. Both are complimentary to use for Schwab clients and there’s no minimum investments required.

You can also seek advising from Schwab and choose a professionally managed mutual fund portfolio, which will be based on your individual goals (like retirement date, desired level of monthly income, etc.).

Browsing through results

Schwab’s mutual fund research tool does not have the prettiest interface, but it’s full of information and quite intuitive when it comes to navigating it.

You can select from various lists, such as large-cap U.S. stock, small- and mid-cap U.S. stock, international, specialty, taxable bond, tax-free bond, and additional fund categories. You can easily compare the hypothetical performance of a $10,000 investment in different mutual funds over various periods of time.

You can sort by Morningstar category, Morningstar overall rating, average annual returns (3 month, 1 year, 3 year, 5 year, 10 year, and inception), as well as upside capture ratio, downside capture ratio, net expense ratio, gross expense ratio, and if funds are categorized as “socially responsible” (ESG) or not.

You can also single out funds managed by Schwab or Laudus, with which Schwab has a partnership, or compare any given mutual funds with the “Compare Funds” tool.

Schwab Top Competitors

Fund examples

Just from the large-cap U.S. stock setting, you instantly have a wide range of no-load, no-fee mutual funds to choose from, including

- Schwab S&P 500 Index Fund (SWPPX)
- Schwab Fundamental US Large Company Index Fund (SFLNX)
- Morgan Stanley Institutional Fund, Inc. Growth Portfolio (MSEGX)
- Franklin DynaTech Fund (FKDNX)
- And many more!

Schwab Mutual Funds Wrapping up

Overall, Schwab has an extensive range of mutual funds that are quite affordable given they are no-load, no-fee funds. Plus, since they have helpful tools for setting up your own portfolio, whether in a DIY way, with robo-tools, or with a full-fledged financial advisor, Schwab is a great place to go if you want to build a portfolio of mutual funds.