Seven out of 20 fund web sites that made a top 20 list last year, failed to make the cut this year because of changes in the selection methodology and criteria, according to Steve Miyao, a senior vice president at kasina, a mutual fund consulting firm, of New York.
In the previous two-years, the list was assembled by the consulting firm of McGladrey & Pullen of Davenport, Iowa. Kasina, which is a spin-off of McGladrey & Pullen, compiled this year's top 20 list.
Companies that made the top 20 list last year but were bumped off this year include: Prudential Insurance Company of Newark N.J.; Firstar of Milwaukee, Wisc.; Principal Financial of Des Moines, Iowa; Maddox Financial Services of London; OppenheimerFunds of NewYork and John Hancock of Boston.
Companies that made the list this year but did not last year were: Calvert Group of Bethesda, Md., E* Trade of Palo Alto, Calif., Janus of Denver, Colo., Safeco Funds of Seattle, Wash., One Group of Columbus, Ohio, Aim of Houston, Texas and Invesco of Atlanta, Ga.
In evaluating the sites this year, kasina focused on internal company factors such as consistency of on-line strategy with overall company strategy, Miyao said. It also, for the first time, conducted company interviews and more exhaustive on-line site evaluations, Miyao said. This year's list also examined how well companies' websites incorporated new Internet technology.
In addition to the seven listed above, the following websites were listed in kasina's 1999 top 20 list: American Century of Kansas City, Mo.; American Funds of Los Angeles; Charles Schwab of San Francisco; Fidelity of Boston; Kemper of Boston; Montgomery Funds of San Francisco; Morgan Stanley/Dean Witter of New York; Scudder of Boston; Stein Roe of Chicago; Strong Funds of Menomonee Falls, Wisc.; TIAA-CREF of New York; T. Rowe Price of Baltimore, Md. and Vanguard of Malvern, Pa.
