December 10, 1991
TO: MARKETING COMMITTEE NO. 45-91
INDUSTRY STATISTICS COMMITTEE NO. 14-91
RE: MINUTES - COMMITTEE ON INDUSTRY STATISTICS - NOV.7
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Status Report on Centralized Data Collection
1. Collection and Dissemination Decisions
New questionnaires have been created and will be distributed
to the fund groups. The monthly questionnaire is designed to
collect performance related data. The quarterly questionnaire
will ask for equity, debt, cash and other asset holdings as
well as yield and annual returns. Third party vendors as well
as members will have access to this data on an individual fund
basis.
There is still a concern about the small fund groups being
able to participate in and benefit from the electronic data
collection process.
2. FUNDS II
BETA sites will begin testing in December. The chosen sites
will be notified as soon as possible.
3. Uses of the NASDAQ feed
Currently we are using the Nasdaq feed and the ICDI
information to verify the integrity of the data we are
collecting. We are now capturing the NAV of all funds on the
feed and are trying to bring to a minimum the number of funds
that will need to be called for their NAV. We are now
receiving and have verified data for approximately 68% of the
money market funds, and we expect that this number will
increase as our verification process continues.
Discussion of ICI Efforts to Improve Reporting
1. Background on Non-Reporters
Each month, approximately 13% of funds that have reported to
ICI at least once in the past do not submit their monthly
questionnaires. The Institute has established a procedure to
collect data from non-reporters by calling them each month,
since May. It has proven to be quite helpful in obtaining the
data, and has reduced the number of nonreporters to
approximately 8%. Unfortunately, the amount of time that is
required to contact all non-reporters cannot be handled by the
research staff on a continuous basis. Further, the percent of
non-reporting funds is consistent each month, showing that
there is no lasting effect to the phone calls.
ICI cannot force funds to report, but it is important that
these funds understand that ICI is working for them, and that
their data may make a difference in the policies that ICI
chooses. ICI can only strongly encourage the funds to report.
Committee Suggestions:
- Have one administrative contact at each fund that will be
able to ensure that the fund submits all ICI
questionnaires.
- Provide some sort of extra benefit to those funds that do
report regularly.
- Deny access to certain information to those funds that are
not reporting regularly.
- Provide non-reporting fund groups with spreadsheets used by
the reporting fund groups in order to make their job
simpler.
3. Use of IVR (Interactive Voice Response)
In order to get all the daily performance data from the funds
that do not report to NASDAQ, ICI is considering implementing
a phone system that will automatically call a fund that does
not report to NASDAQ or a fund that has reported but whose NAV
exceeds a threshold based on its history.
Sales by Distribution Channel
1. Background
The Source of Sales survey has several problems caused by the
definition and interpretation of sales channels. There are no
distinct guidelines to defining particular channels so there
is no consistency among the fund groups. Therefore, the report
produced with this data is flawed. Data has shown to be
inconsistent from year to year for some fund groups. Also the
Source of Sales report published by ICI is not timely enough.
Members would like the data earlier.
2. Report from Consortium Meeting
Jake Dreyer updated the committee on the discussion at the
consortium.
3. Meaning of Channels
A committee member representing each of the three broadly
defined channels, Sales Force Proprietary, Sales Force Non-
proprietary, Direct Marketing, discussed his perspective in
defining the sales channels. A discussion revealed that there
is still deviation in the way that sales channels are defined
and that each group has different priorities in tracking
different channels. In addition, all groups are interested in
tracking institutional sales and some consider this a new
channel.
4. Problems and Obstacles
The different sales channels used by the fund groups need to
be defined more clearly, as there is some gray area. The
committee is interested in the data in this area because it
has never been made available to them as a study. It is
important in marketing strategy to understand where and how
each sales channel is most effective.
Committee Business
1. Assignment of Tasks
ICI staff were asked to research items for a survey on
retirement. All the members were interested in more extensive
research in this area.
2. Next Meeting
The next meeting of the Industry Statistics Committee is
tentatively scheduled for mid-February.