In a statement yesterday, the NASD named the top executives who will be part of a 21 member committee to make recommendations on mutual fund costs and sales agreements. Vanguard Chairman John Brennan and Franklin Resources’ co-chief executive Martin Flanagan will serve on the committee.
The membership of the commitee includes representatives from at least nine firms that have been recently fined or investigated by authorities or said they dismissed employees suspected of trading or sales improprieties.
Other commitee members include Paul Haaga, EVP of Capital Research & Management (parent company of American Funds); Robert Pozen, chairman of MFS Investment Management, James Riepe, VP of T. Rowe Price; and David Jones, SVP of Fidelity Investments. NASD President Robert Glauber will serve as the chairman of the committee.
The commitee will also include representatives from Amvescap, Charles Schwab, Merrill Lynch, Legg Mason, A.G. Edwards, Linsco Private Ledger Financial Services, and UBS.
The recommendations of the NASD commitee will be quite important as they will be providing timely input to the SEC’s rulemaking process. In the first phase, the NASD task force will consider mutual fund portfolio transaction costs — including directed brokerage arrangements, soft dollars and disclosure. It’s expected the task force will report back to the SEC sometime this summer.