Mutual fund investors could receive better, more useful disclosure of the key information they need if regulators adopted a quick start guide, according to the Investment Company Institute.
“As our lives and the tools we use grow increasingly complex,” says Paul Schott Stevens, the president and CEO. “Experts in the technology field have developed one answer, the ‘quick-start’ guide. You may have noticed that every consumer electronics product you’ve bought recently, be it a digital camera or an MP3 player or a software program, comes with one. With this guide, you can use the device without having to slog through a long, detailed, but often confusing user’s manual.”
ICI research has shown that only one-third of mutual fund purchasers consult the fund prospectus before investing in a fund. Other ICI studies show that in 2006, 92 percent of fund investors have Internet access, and 70 percent went online every day.