Owned by its investors, Long-term growth
To take a stand for all investors, to treat them fairly and to give them the best chance for investment success
Vanguard manages $12 trillion for more than 50 million clients, and it has no outside shareholders. It is owned by its funds, which are owned by the people who invest in them, so the money it saves by running the funds well goes back to them as lower fees. Its average fund costs 0.06% a year against an industry average of 0.44%. Its priorities for 2026 are bonds, cash, advice, technology, and a voice for its owners.
Mutual ownership and low cost
Active bonds at index-like prices
Advice, cash, and proxy voting
Part I
7
Vanguard is owned by its funds, which are owned by its fund shareholders, so the company’s aim and its owners’ aim are the same.
Vanguard’s funds are owned by their shareholders.
22 million
Equity index fund investors who can direct how their shares are voted through Vanguard Investor Choice.
Each coin is one dollar of a year’s cost on $10,000 invested.
Vanguard’s average fund costs 0.06% a year, $6 for every $10,000 invested. The industry average is 0.44%.
That is $38 a year less on every $10,000, worked out from the two figures.
$500million+
saved for investors from 1 February 2025 through 2026.
$250million
of it expected in 2026 alone.
84
share classes across 53 funds cut in February 2026.
Vanguard’s aspiration in serving its clients: strong funds bring growth and scale, an engaged crew, trusted advice, and a better experience, and these bring loyal clients and better outcomes for them.
Vanguard is owned by its funds and they by their investors, and it has cut expense ratios more than 2,100 times in over 50 years. A promise held up by who owns the company does not depend on any one year’s resolve. We recommend building a strategy on a structural fact about who benefits, so that the promise survives a change of leaders and a hard quarter.
Vanguard states its cost as $6 per $10,000 invested against an industry average of $44, and its active bond funds at 0.10% against 0.40%. We recommend putting a plan’s advantage into the unit the customer pays in and against the average of the field, so that the gap is one they can feel.
Vanguard says only one in five Americans works with a fee-based financial advisor, and it offers Digital Advisor at 0.15% from $100, with AI-enabled advice coming. We recommend naming the customers a business is not yet reaching and setting a price for them that can be held, so that a service once kept for the wealthy becomes the ordinary one.
Headwater is not connected with The Vanguard Group, Inc. Vanguard is a trade mark of its owner. Updated 29 September 2026.