"Becoming compliant is a big deal," said Steve Levitt, referring to American Century Investment Management's intent to comply with the AIMR performance presentation standards.
The Kansas City, Mo.-based money management company hired Spaulding Group, Somerset, N.J., to help with that objective.
Mr. Levitt, American Century's director of portfolio content and analysis, said the firm is trying to bolster its institutional appeal, extending its reach beyond its traditional retail mutual fund market.
"We're doing it to ensure our (performance) reporting goes across our clientele, from retail to institutional," he said.
For its mutual funds, he noted, it already meets regulatory reporting standards of the Securities and Exchange Commission and other authorities. AIMR compliance, however, is voluntary.
American Century will bring all of its $113 billion under management into AIMR compliance, Mr. Levitt said. Some $50 billion of its assets are from tax-exempt institutional clients. American Century set a target of June 30 for realizing compliance under the standards of the Association for Investment Management and Research, Charlottesville, Va., he said.
One of Spaulding's key tasks will be helping the company construct composites of all its portfolios, he said, adding, "We view the biggest challenge in becoming compliant as the creation of composites."
He said company executives are still discussing levels of verification that it will have performed.
The AIMR standards, designed to achieve greater uniformity and comparability among managers, have been controversial as far as the degree to which money managers choose to come into compliance and get verification.
