RetireJapan

Hi I'm new both to this forum and to investing. I've opened a NISA account on SBI and am trying to purchase shares of certain index funds by setting a set Yen amount to purchase. What I'm finding is that for every index fund I look at, although the 買付手数料（税込) is listed as なし, my purchase gets me fewer shares than I expect, given the value of the stock. The amount of value I'm shorted is always 4.75% of my purchase. I've tried searching for hidden fees and can't find anything. I've noticed that this 4.75% holds for 8 different funds I've tried purchasing, and doesn't depend on the purchase amount either.

To give a concrete example, If I try to purchase 10,000 yen worth of shares of ニッセイ－ニッセイ日経２２５インデックスファンド , this gets me an "estimated" 3557 shares (10,000 JPY / 3557 shares * 10,000 shares = effectively 28,114 JPY per 10,000 shares on my purchase). However, the current value per 10,000 shares is listed by SBI at 26,777 yen. Using their listed current value, my 3557 shares is actually worth 3557 shares x 26,777 JPY / 10,000 shares = 9525 JPY. I've lost 475 yen (4.75%) of value on my purchase. This calculation holds no matter how much I purchase and no matter which "no-load" fund I buy.

I have one theory: I did notice that the number of shares I am purchasing is "estimated", so perhaps this is the catch? Perhaps, the number of shares I get will depend on the price at the time of purchase, and this is some kind of conservative estimate SBI uses to approximate how many shares you'll get. I'm not sure how to confirm this without actually purchasing something and I'd like to know the fine-print before I do so.

So my question is this: Has anyone noticed this discrepancy? If someone could confirm if this 4.75% is just something to do with estimates on number of shares prior to purchasing, that'd be great. If there are actually fees, does anyone know what they are and where we can read about them on SBI's website?

Another theory I have is that I'm just so new to this that I have no idea what's going on, in which case I would welcome some education!

You're right. It's not a fee. The price they quote only an estimate because the price is set at the end of the day. They use yesterday's price plus a 5% margin of safety to make sure there is enough money to cover the transaction (for example, if you order a fixed number of shares on a day when the price suddenly jumped). The order is settled at the actual price at the end of the day, and any excess money would be returned to the account. In your case, because you're buying a fixed yen amount no money will be returned and you will just receive more shares than the estimate. If that makes sense...
They have an example here https://faq.sbisec.co.jp/faq_detail.htm ... 781&page=1.

Thank you very much for clearing that up and for posting the link! It makes perfect sense - the number of shares they give is an estimate since they can't know the closing price in advance.