The more informed you are, the better. Yet there’s so much information about mutual funds available, from performance data to legal disclosures, that it’s understandable to wonder what information you really need to know.
For the past three weeks, many investors have been able to check out new information that falls into this category. On a fund company’s website, they can click on list of available money-market funds to see daily updates showing tiny changes in the market value of a money fund’s portfolio.
Average investors and institutions use these safe-harbor investments as parking places for cash that’s temporarily kept out of stocks or higher-yielding segments of the bond market.
Goldman Sachs on Jan. 9 became the first to post daily values of its money funds. More than a half-dozen other companies have since followed suit or announced similar plans. They include the largest money fund provider, Fidelity Investments, as well as such names as Charles Schwab, Federated Investors, BlackRock and JPMorgan.
There’s minimal practical value for average investors to review these numbers. Money funds get relatively little attention because they’re low-risk investments, and their portfolios of short-term bonds generate tiny returns even in the best of times.
But by voluntarily making these daily disclosures, the money fund industry is doing more than just serving investors. It’s trying to convince regulators that it’s open to some degree of change, in hopes of heading off more far-reaching rules that are under consideration to stabilize money funds.
“All of a sudden, the industry got religion on transparency,” says Peter Crane of money fund researcher Crane Data. “It’s throwing a bone to regulators.”
With its leadership in transition, it’s too early to say how the Securities and Exchange Commission will react to the industry’s increased openness. But the step could convince regulators that there’s no need to require funds to hold loss reserves — there are none currently — or that there’s no need to set limits on how quickly investors can withdraw cash.
Generating even more industry opposition is a proposal that the value of money fund shares float, rather than be kept at the current fixed $1 per share. Allowing money funds to be priced slightly above or below $1 would reflect the market value of the fund’s holdings at a given time.
With nearly $2.7 trillion in assets, money funds’ critical role in the financial system became clear during the financial crisis.
After the crisis, the industry largely embraced new SEC rules to stabilize money funds. But some regulators say additional changes are needed.