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Money Management Executive

Fed Rate Cut Would Hurt Money Fund Investors Even More

June 13, 2003, 1:00 a.m. EDT 1 Min Read

Money market mutual fund companies and their investors can expect even lower yields than they are suffering now if the Federal Reserve cuts interest rates again, Reuters reports.

According to iMoneyNet, taxable money market funds are currently yielding a record low 0.68% on average, and tax-free funds are yielding 0.57%.

The forthcoming meeting of the Federal Reserve on June 24 and June 25 is largely expected to produce a cut by a quarter to a half of a percentage point, economists told Reuters in a poll.

However, managers, such as Federated and Dreyfus, that offer money market funds to institutional clients can offset the cut by lowering their fees, said Peter Crane, managing editor of iMoneyNet. But that will hurt profits for such companies that are leaders in the money market mutual fund space. At Federated, for instance, 77% of the firm’s $196 billion in assets are money market funds, and they generate 48% of revenue.

Meanwhile, firms that with broker-sold funds with fees locked in B shares, companies such as Alliance and American Funds, will have a difficult time dealing with a rate cut, and their investors are likely to see yields fall significantly.

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Money Management Executive
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