# What a round trip really costs

> Learn to add up the full cost of buying, holding and selling an ETF (spread, premium, fee and tax) with real ETFIQ cost data for two funds.

Data as of Nov 10, 2026. Rebuilt every trading night.

## What a round trip really costs: spread, premium, fee and tax

Data as of Nov 10, 2026. Rebuilt every trading night.

Owning $10,000 of TINY for a year to Nov 10, 2026 cost about $171 all in, against $58 for its fee alone.

Trading Basics · Lesson 7 of 7 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Slide the amount to see one year of fee, spread and premium in each fund. Amount (hypothetical) $10,000 On $10,000: TINY fee $58, TINY spread, round trip $65, TINY premium paid $48, NOBL fee $35, NOBL spread, round trip $2, NOBL premium paid $2. Hypothetical amounts. Costs as of Nov 10, 2026; one round trip, median premium paid on entry. Step 1: the pieces, in percent. Step 2: one year. NOBL: 0.35% + 0.02% + 0.0224 % ≈ 0.39% , × $10,000 = $39 . The fee is $35 of it. TINY: 0.58% + 0.65% + 0.4750 % = 1.7050 %, × $10,000 = $171 . The fee is only $58 of it. Step 3: five years, still one round trip. Five years of fee, plus the same one-time trading cost (spread + premium): NOBL: 5 × 0.35% + 0.04% ≈ 1.79% , $179 TINY: 5 × 0.58% + 1.1250 % = 4.03% , $403 Step 4: tax (hypothetical). Say the $10,000 grows to $11,000 and you sell: a $1,000 gain. In a US taxable account, a gain on something held one year or less is taxed at your ordinary income rate; held more than a year , at the lower long-term rate. At a hypothetical 22% income rate and 15% long-term rate: Sell after 11 months: $1,000 × 22% = $220 Sell after 13 months: $1,000 × 15% = $150 Your own rates depend on your income. Trades inside a retirement account such as an IRA are not taxed when you make them.

### The question

The fee is the only cost listed. What does buying, holding and selling an ETF really cost?

### The idea

- A round trip (buying, then later selling) has up to four costs. Only one is printed as a fee. - The spread ( lesson 3 ): a round trip pays all of it once.

- The premium ( lesson 4 ): if the price sits above the NAV when you buy, you pay extra.

- The expense ratio: the percent of your money the fund keeps each year to run itself.

- Tax on any gain, when you sell in a taxable account.

- The first two are paid each time you trade . The fee is paid each year you hold . So how often you trade decides which cost matters most.

### Worked example

The 4 steps beside the drawing at the top work this through on ETFIQ data. Point at a step to light the part of the drawing it describes.

$10,000 in each of NOBL and TINY, on data to Nov 10, 2026 . ETFIQ's "full cost to own" adds the fee for each year held, one round trip at the spread, and the typical (median) premium paid on the way in.

| | Spread (round trip) | Median premium | Yearly fee |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| NOBL | 0.02% | 0.0224 % | 0.35% |
| TINY | 0.65% | 0.4750 % | 0.58% |

In TINY, 66% of the year's cost comes from trading , not the fee.

Holding longer spreads the one-time trading cost over more years; trading more often does the reverse.

### The common mistake

"The expense ratio is what an ETF costs." It is only the cost of holding. Every trade adds the spread, and sometimes a premium. In NOBL the fee is nearly all of it. In TINY, one round trip costs more than a year of fees, and selling within a year can raise the tax as well.

### Check your understanding

Pick an answer to see why. Two of three right passes the lesson.

1. Which costs do you pay every time you buy and sell, however long you hold? A The spread and any premium B The expense ratio C Long-term capital gains tax D None; ETF trades are free Answer: A. The spread and any premium. the spread and premium are built into the trade price, so each round trip pays them again. Not B: the expense ratio is charged for each year you hold, not per trade. 2. A fund has a 0.10% fee, a 0.50% spread and no premium. You buy $10,000, hold one year and sell. About what does it cost? A $10 B $50 C $60 D $110 Answer: C. $60. fee $10,000 × 0.10% = $10, plus one round trip at the spread, $10,000 × 0.50% = $50: $60. Not A: $10 is the fee alone; the spread is five times bigger here. 3. You have a $1,000 gain in a taxable account, held 11 months. What changes if you wait until after 12 months to sell? A Nothing changes B The gain is taxed at the lower long-term rate C The gain is no longer taxed D The spread is refunded Answer: B. The gain is taxed at the lower long-term rate. gains held more than a year are long-term and taxed at lower rates in the US. Not C: a long-term gain is still taxed, just less.

### Takeaways

- Add the spread and premium to the fee: the fee is only the cost of holding.

- The more often you trade, the more the trading costs outweigh the fee; any fund's Trading tab adds them up for you.

- In a taxable account, how long you hold changes the tax on a gain.

### Do it on ETFIQ

Add up the full cost of your fund Your fund

### Where to next

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Source: ETFIQ, independent ETF data. Recomputed nightly from public filings and prices.
Cite: ETFIQ, What a round trip really costs: spread, premium, fee and tax, data as of Nov 10, 2026. https://etfiq.com/academy/trading-basics/trading-costs-add-up/
Licence: https://etfiq.com/license/ Data ETFIQ computes is free to use with attribution: ETFIQ (etfiq.com). Issuer data stays under its owner's terms.
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