Compliance

Diplomat. Detective. Politician. Strategist. Entertainer. Financier. Referee.

An industry as competitive and highly regulated as the mutual fund industry could not possibly slip one by investors, right?

The bear market, a steep decline in mutual fund and variable annuity sales and the strain of product guarantees, will result in widespread downgrades at life insurance and annuity companies, all of the major ratings agencies have announced,

PALM DESERT, Calif. - There's no question that the Securities and Exchange Commission has left the mutual fund industry a little confused lately.

PALM DESERT, Calif. - Ensuring that fund companies are complying with provisions of new anti-corporate fraud legislation will be at the top of the Securities and Exchange Commission's agenda for regulating fund companies in 2003, an SEC official said late last month.

The Massachusetts Securities Division has charged a Denver broker/dealer with scaring elderly people into abandoning their securities in favor of annuities with outrageous commissions.

PALM DESERT, Calif. - Outdated and risky in this age of accounting scandals plaguing Wall Street. That is how a fund consultant and author described the fund industry's model for reviewing corporate reporting. To stave off future legislation, a new model is needed, the speaker told the 700 fund accountants gathered here last week at the Investment Company Institute's Tax & Accounting Conference.

The backlash against corporate secrecy spilled over into the usually clean mutual fund industry as the Securities and Exchange Commission took a first step last week in requiring mutual funds to disclose their proxy voting policies and votes.

The Securities and Exchange Commission's proposal to require publicly traded companies to reveal their so-called critical accounting policies is a step in the right direction, according to leading fund companies.

Joseph Carrier, vice president and treasurer of the T. Rowe Price Funds, weighed in on a number of subjects concerning the industry during a recent interview with Mutual Fund Market News Associate Editor Chris Frankie. Carrier, chairman of the Investment Company Institute's Accounting/Treasurers Committee, also spoke about some of the topics to be discussed at the ICI 2002 Tax & Accounting Conference in Palm Desert, Calif., this week.

Changes to Illinois tax law may make the state's 529 college savings plan more attractive to Illinois residents, but they could also inspire other states to try to get residents to favor their in-state 529 plans. If that happens, fund companies that have established a 529 footprint in one state may have to scramble to form alliances with multiple states to get them into their plan.

The mutual fund industry is balking at a proposed new Securities and Exchange Commission rule that would require top executives to personally sign off on each of their funds' annual and semi-annual reports.

A mutual fund advisor that has outspokenly bemoaned the corporate scandals plaguing Wall Street this year, even put its weight behind the movement to leverage fund assets to pressure public corporations into reform, has been fined by the Securities and Exchange Commission for improper disclosure.

Shortly after the Securities and Exchange Commission decided to require top executives of mutual fund companies to certify their firms' financial reports, the commission proposed in an open meeting last week to extend the rule to shareholder reports, as well.

Expensing options could be expensive. While fund industry leaders are calling for uniform expensing of options, some fear such action could drag corporate earnings down by 23% or more. And with the markets as ugly as they have been, now is not a good time to risk further losses, opponents to regulation say.

A number of leading fund companies, Fidelity Investments of Boston and Charles Schwab & Co. of San Francisco included, are resisting a proposal that would require them to make a fund's monthly performance available to investors by the third day after the month.

NEW YORK - A crisis of confidence among investors is worse than many thought, a panel of investment executives hosted by the New York Society of Security Analysts concurred last week.

The mutual fund industry's chief lobby group sent a stern message to the Senate last week, urging it to allow fund companies to provide 401(k) investors with advice as part of the pension reform legislation that lawmakers are now considering.

With lawmakers in Washington calling for Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Harvey Pitt's resignation, fund executives said the mutual fund industry is likely to support the embattled regulator.

As President Bush laid out a tough new stance last week on the increasing number of accounting scandals that plague Wall Street, fund executives turned their attention to accounting practices. Many executives said that portfolio managers have been too lazy about assessing the risk involved with the stocks they choose.