SEC Proposes Fund Manager Disclosures

March 11, 2004 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - A new proposal by federal regulators designed to help curb abusive mutual fund trading would give investors detailed data about the managers of their funds.

The US Securities and Exchange Commission proposal would force fund families to disclose the identities of members of portfolio management teams as well as their compensation and whether they own shares in the funds they manage, the Associated Press reported.

The proposal is meant to unearth more about portfolio managers including their incentives and potential conflicts of interest when they manage multiple fund portfolios, according to the report.

The new information “may assist fund shareholders in gauging whether the portfolio manager’s financial interests are in harmony with their own,” SEC chairman William Donaldson said. He added, however: “We need to be mindful that, taken too far, this type of disclosure could seriously intrude on the privacy of portfolio managers.”

The agency will seek a solution that provides needed information to investors without serious privacy violations before it formally adopts new rules, Donaldson promised.

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