Cost
The Cost Ledger
Most families can tell you their return. Almost none can tell you their cost.
What we do
We take the structure apart.
Fund TERs, and the fees inside the funds those funds hold. Platform and custody charges. Advisory and wrapper costs. FX spreads on every conversion. Performance fees and the actual mechanics of how they crystallise. Insurance and structured product loadings, including the ones priced into the product rather than charged on top of it.
It comes back as one figure for total annual drag, in currency, with every line traced to the document it came from. Then a second figure: what is recoverable, ranked by size and by how hard it is to move.
Then it keeps running. The Cost Ledger is a live object in the system, not a report you file. It updates as positions change, and it reruns in full every year.
| Line | Source | Annual (USD) |
|---|---|---|
| Fund TER, primary | Prospectus | 184,200 |
| Underlying fund layer | Annual report | 62,400 |
| Platform and custody | Platform terms | 41,880 |
| Advisory | Advisory agreement | 96,000 |
| FX spread | Statements | 28,940 |
| Wrapper loading | Policy schedule | 19,610 |
| Total annual drag | 433,030 | |
| Recoverable, identified | 168,400 |
What you get
A per-holding cost decomposition. Total drag in currency and basis points. A recoverable figure with a route to each item. Benchmarking of every fee against what the same exposure costs elsewhere. A renegotiation brief for each counterparty, written to be sent.
What it usually finds
Share class inefficiency. Platform charges that stopped being competitive years ago. FX spreads on standing conversions that nobody ever tendered. Advisory fees layered on top of underlying fees for the same work. Performance fees calculated without a high-water mark. Structured products whose cost is entirely internal.
What it does not do
Tell you to fire anyone. Most of the time the relationship is fine and the pricing is not, which is a conversation you can now have with evidence instead of a feeling.