High upfront mutual fund commissions are back. My colleague Kayezad E. Adajania collected data on commissions paid on 25 new fund offers (of the 32 launched) in 2014 (you can read the story here:http://goo.gl/ea8zZD ) and found two things. One, upfront commissions are back at top rates of about 8%. Two, commissions are paid according to the bargaining position of the seller. The individual financial advisers are the lowest in the pecking order and get the smallest commissions while banks appropriate the most.