Glossary
What is a PIE fund?
Updated Reviewed quarterly
A PIE (Portfolio Investment Entity) is a NZ tax structure that caps your investment income tax rate at 28% — your Prescribed Investor Rate (PIR). PIE funds calculate and pay your tax automatically. Every NZX-listed ETF on this site (Smartshares, Kernel) is PIE-structured.
The big advantage of PIE: investors on the 33% or 39% marginal income tax rate pay only 28% on their PIE investments. The other big advantage is that FIF rules don't apply to NZ-domiciled PIE funds — so even if you hold $500,000 worth of Smartshares USF (a PIE wrapper around the S&P 500), you escape the FIF complexity that direct US ETF holdings would trigger. Find your PIR on the IRD website.
Where you’ll see this term
- Deeper dive: PIE vs FIF — full comparison — when each applies, worked tax-rate examples
- RWT on NZ ETFs (PIE bypasses RWT)
- All NZ-listed (PIE-taxed) ETFs
- FIF — what NZ ETFs avoid
