MutualFundWire.com
The insiders' edge for 40 Act industry executives!
an InvestmentWires' Publication
an InvestmentWires' Publication
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MutualFundWire.com
The insiders' edge for 40 Act industry executives!
an InvestmentWires' Publication |
|
Wednesday, January 17, 2001 Portal Portents Independent advisors and financial planners are targets of a new mutual fund venture. Fidelity, Putnam, Franklin Templeton, and PFPC have joined forces to present intermediaries with a portal which allows full transactional access to a host of different fund families. Terms have not yet been agreed upon, but the four principles expect to assume joint ownership. They are fronting the development costs, but fund firms will pay for access. These unlikely bedfellows cited client demand and service as the key motivators to the joint venture, which is designed to provide infrastructure to independent advisors. "Our investment professionals have, for a period of time, asked for the ability to transact business across fund families, we were each in our own way dedicated to building our businesses to accommodate them," said Ken Rathgaber, chief operations officer for Fidelity Institutional Services. "We thought this was the fastest way to meet this need. This is something reps have wanted for a long time." While advisors will be able to make transactions on one site, this does not preclude the advisor sites mushrooming across the Internet. All funds will have links to their sites and will continue to encourage traffic through their own content. The portal is not expected to provide definitive utilities for clients. "We may have some tools on there, but really the objective is to provide the service element," said Rathgaber "It's critical to us that we maintain a level playing field." The portal is slated to be up and running in the third quarter of this year with about a hundred fund families. It is based upon PFPC's existing platform, but faces the challenge of implementing innumerable transfer agencies. The aggregated information on the site is downloadable and will be compatible with Advent and Centerpiece. As an added benefit, eventually advisors will be able to provide client access to the un-named portal. Printed from: MFWire.com/story.asp?s=26355 Copyright 2001, InvestmentWires, Inc. All Rights Reserved |