More Mutual Funds Shutting Doors

Facing a tough market environment, greater regulatory scrutiny and rising costs as a result of new rules, more mutual funds are closing their doors these days, The New York Times reports. In the past two weeks, the WWW Internet, Growth Flex, Market Opportunities and Oakmark Small Cap funds have all decided to shut their doors.

"It’s refreshing to see a board do the right thing," commented Russell Kinnel, director of fund research at Morningstar. "It may be another sign that Eliot Spitzer’s campaign is having an effect."
In explaining why his firm decided to close down the Oakmark Small Cap Fund, John Raitt, chief executive officer of the fund’s investment advisory firm, Harris Associates, explained that the fund has lagged its peers each of the past three years by more than 10 percentage points. "We hadn’t been able to fix the fund and decided that the fairest thing to do was to give the money back to our shareholders."

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The staff of Money Management Executive ("MME") has prepared these capsule summaries based on reports published by the news sources to which they are attributed. Those news sources are not associated with MME, and have not prepared, sponsored, endorsed, or approved these summaries.

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