Share class

A share class (or unit class) is a distinct version of a fund that shares the same portfolio with the fund's other classes but differs in one or more terms: currency of denomination, whether income is accumulated or distributed, whether currency exposure is hedged, the fee level, and who may buy it (retail, clean, institutional, seed). Each class has its own ISIN, its own NAV and its own ongoing charges.

Naming conventions are house-specific. Letters such as A, B, C, I, X or Z, suffixes like "Acc", "Dist", "H" or "Hedged", and currency codes are all common, but the same letter means different things at different managers.

Why it matters

Almost every fund data question is really a share class question. Performance, fees, yield and risk indicator can all differ between classes of one fund, so comparing an institutional accumulating class with a retail distributing class produces misleading results. Developers should treat the share class ISIN as the primary key and only group classes into a "fund" when they explicitly want to.

In the API

The class label and its defining attributes are returned alongside the fund-level facts.

json
{
  "shareClass": "A EUR Acc",
  "keyFacts": {
    "currency": "EUR",
    "distribution": "Accumulating"
  },
  "headlineMetrics": { "ter": 1.5 }
}

Example values. Request each class by its own ISIN; the API does not merge classes.

Common pitfalls

• Assets under management are often reported at fund level while fees and NAV are per class. Check which one a document shows.
• A class can be closed to new investors or restricted by jurisdiction even though its data is public.