What is an S&P 500 Index fund?

Can anyone tell me what a (Vanguard) no-load (low-fee) index fund, specifically an S&P 500 or total market index fund is?

This is a good site to get answers to your questions :

http://www.fool.com/MutualFunds/IndexFun...

Have a nice day !

An index fund is simply a fund that invests in the same stocks that make up it's namesake index. An S&P 500 Index Fund invests in the 500 stocks that make up the S&P 500 index.

Unlike actively managed funds, the managers do not buy and sell stocks based on how they think the stocks will do. They hold whatever is in the index and buy and sell only when the stocks in the index change (which is infrequently).

The advantage is low trading costs and a guarantee that you won't do worse than the underlying index. It also guarantees that you'll never do better than the underlying index. Since many mutual funds underperform the market, a lot of people are content to match the market.

ticker SPY is the S&P 500, pretty sure its low 0.08%

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