Fees
There may be a percentage charge levied on the purchase of shares or units. Some of these fees are called an initial charge (UK) or 'front-end load' (US). Some fees are charged by a fund on the sale of these units, called a 'close-end load,' that may be waived after several years of owning the fund. Some of the fees cover the cost of distributing the fund by paying commission to the adviser or broker that arranged the purchase. These fees are commonly referred to as 12b-1 fees in U.S. Not all fund have initial charges; if there are no such charges levied, the fund is "no-load" (US).
These charges may represent profit for the fund manager or go back into the fund.
Read more about this topic: Open-end Fund