ICI Viewpoints Content

Fund firms that offer interval funds—a type of closed-end fund that periodically offers to repurchase a portion of its shares—face unique operational challenges. To address these, ICI's Broker-Dealer Advisory Committee recently launched the Working Group on Interval Funds. The working...

Have you ever done one small, smart thing that ended up making a huge difference in your future? I'm not talking about blind luck—like buying a ticket that turns out to be the winner in the (currently) $1.6 billion Mega Millions. No, I'm talking about small, smart decisions that can...

Policymakers and regulators at the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) have renewed their interest in proxy voting issues recently. Among the items under discussion at an upcoming SEC Roundtable is the idea that a fund would only be allowed to vote on portfolio company proxies...

A key assertion in "Cracking the Proxy Racket" (The Wall Street Journal's Review & Outlook, September 18) is that asset managers vote "in block" to support recommendations set forth by advisory firms like Glass Lewis and Institutional Shareholder Services. Such statements ought to be...

US household activity in the stock market has undergone a transformation over the past three decades. The old idea that investing in the stock market is just for the wealthy is vastly out of date. In the late 1980s, less than a third of US households held stocks. Now, a majority do...

Economists and legal scholars have issued pointed critiques and empirical rebuttals of the "common ownership" hypothesis—the notion that institutional investors holding small, non-controlling stakes in competing companies in concentrated industries decrease competition and raise...

Individual retirement accounts (IRAs) represent the largest share of assets in the US retirement market, with assets totaling $9.2 trillion at year-end 2017. Forty-seven percent of this total is held in mutual funds, with IRA mutual fund investors primarily invested in equity funds...

Mutual fund shareholders were among the millions of people affected by the numerous natural disasters that affected the United States during 2017. The recent volcanic event in Hawaii is another reminder that disasters—natural or manmade—can strike anytime, anywhere. As both the summer...

Forget what you’ve heard about artificial intelligence (AI), Tom Eck, chief technology officer for IBM industry platforms, told the crowd at ICI’s 60th annual General Membership Meeting. Despite its depiction sometimes in popular culture as a malevolent force, he said, there is...

Emerging leaders in the asset management industry are at the forefront of changes that will fundamentally affect the business—from technology, to client expectations, to how to attract and retain top talent. During a panel at ICI’s Operations and Technology Conference, held...