The Investment Company Institute (ICI), the national association of US investment companies, has launched a new trade organization to focus on regulatory, market and other issues for global investment funds, their managers and investors.
ICI Global is the first industry body to focus exclusively on the perspective of globally active funds. Its members will include regulated US and non-US based funds publicly offered to investors in jurisdictions worldwide. The London-based organization will serve as a conduit for proactive dialogue with a broad range of national and transnational regulators. It will also advocate for regulatory policies that promote funds as long-term investing vehicles. A key part of its strategy will be to work in close cooperation with national and regional fund and other associations worldwide.
Dan Waters will be the managing director of ICI Global. He previously worked at the UK Financial Services Authority for 12 years, where he directed asset management policy. Waters will lead ICI Globals international funds work from the London office.
Jamie Broderick, head of JP Morgan Asset Management in Europe, will chair ICI Globals Steering Committee.
ICI Global will seek to advance the common interests and promote public understanding of global investment funds, their managers, and their investors as market and regulatory issues increasingly cross borders, said Paul Schott Stevens, ICIs CEO. It will build upon and expand ICIs long-standing international advocacy on issues that affect millions of investors worldwide.
Commenting on his new position, Waters said, Global funds and fund managers face a complex array of regulatory and policy challenges. Finding appropriate global solutions for these challenges requires the capacity to look beyond national and regional approaches to focus on genuine, value-adding global answers. ICI Global is uniquely placed to take up this challenge.
ICI Globals policy priorities and purposes fall into four categories: the role of funds and fund managers in financial stability (non-bank financial intermediation and its role in financial stability); key transnational regulatory developments for funds (including tax and accounting issues such as FATCA and their impact on the global investment funds industry and how custody-related issues such as UCITS IV and AIFMD could extend beyond Europe); global trading and market structure policy developments (including the use of derivatives by funds); and retirement savings and pension systems (meeting the challenge of retirement savings as people globally continue to live longer).
ICI Global responds to a rapidly growing transnational environment for global investment funds, said Broderick. As financial markets converge and funds activities become more global, regulators are increasingly coordinating their efforts internationally. Funds need a strong and informed source on issues that cross borders to inform the policy agenda worldwide.
International fund management groups have expressed their plans to join ICI Global, said the ICI. These include Capital Research and Management, Federated Investors Funds, Franklin Templeton Investments, Goldman Sachs Asset Management, Invesco, JP Morgan Asset Management, Legg Mason, Nuveen Investments, PIMCO Funds, T. Rowe Price, Threadneedle and Vanguard. Over the next few weeks, ICI Global will enlarge its steering committee with members from these groups.
(JDC)