6 min readMutual fund giant Fidelity signaled a change in the money-market fund landscape with its January announcement that it plans to convert some of its prime money funds into government funds. The conversion of the prime funds—those that invest in corporate securities—seems to anticipate a mass move by investors out of prime funds in response to…
3 min readNEW YORK, July 22, 2014 /PRNewswire/ – Designed to help maximize risk-adjusted performance, BNY Mellon’s Global Collateral Services business today announced the addition of FundIQ®, a third party market research and analytical tool to benchmark performance and areas of risk for institutional prime money market mutual funds. Through BNY Mellon’s new service, which is available…
4 min readAlthough the cost to insure against a U.S. government debt default is rising and short-term Treasury yields are climbing, asset managers are counseling CFOs and treasurers to avoid selling off short-term Treasury notes that they hold in cash investment portfolios. A failure of the U.S. Congress to raise the limit on federal government borrowing by…
3 min readThe Securities and Exchange Commission’s proposed regulations for the money fund industry would entail significant changes for prime funds that target institutional investors, changes that could discourage treasurers from using such funds. If the regulations are adopted, many treasuries are expected to shift cash out of prime funds to government or treasury money market funds,…
3 min readSeveral factors have converged to increase counterparty risk – that is, the chance that one party in a contractual agreement doesn’t fulfill its obligations. That’s especially the case when considering the risk within financial institutions, as Lance Pan, director of investment research with Capital Advisors Group, lays out in this whitepaper. One factor driving this…
4 min readThe 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 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…
3 min readThe asset management industry’s chief trade group said it would support temporary withdrawal restrictions for U.S. money market mutual funds, but said in comments to regulators Thursday that bigger changes are not needed to help sustain financial markets during crisis. Standing its ground, the Investment Company Institute reiterated positions it had previously spelled out for…
5 min readAfter resisting the idea of mark-to-market for years, large money-market-fund sponsors such as Goldman Sachs, Fidelity Investments, JPMorgan, and BlackRock are now partially embracing it. Instead of waiting for regulators to force them, these fund sponsors have started voluntarily disclosing the day-to-day fluctuations in their funds’ per-share market value, called net asset value (NAV). The…
4 min readNov 14 BNY Mellon Corp’s investment management chief on Wednesday said he saw “some merit” to stiffer capital requirements and other rules for money funds proposed by U.S. regulators, in comments that exposed a schism in the $2.5 trillion industry. BNY Mellon investment chief Curtis Arledge’s positive remarks contrasted sharply with fund industry comments on…
3 min readWeak payroll gains and a labor force exodus in Friday’s jobs report suggest the economy is suffering long-term structural damage, as the Federal Reserve has feared. They may make new Fed action likely, but many question if that will do much good. Weak payroll gains and a labor force exodus in Friday’s jobs report suggest…