Investment Fund Law Blog
In commemorating the 75th anniversary of the Investment Company Act and Investment Advisers Act, David Grim discussed his views about the past, present and future of the investment management industry. He selected four topics which in his opinion best illustrate the adaptability which the authors gave the 1940 laws governing the asset management industry.
Those topics are: (1) the role of exchange-traded funds (ETFs), (2) the role of private fund advisers, (3) the role of disclosure and reporting in our regulatory framework, and (4) the role of the board in fund oversight.
He called disclosure one of the critical pieces of the 40 Acts, and noted that the amount of information available to investors about funds and advisers through publicly available forms, prospectuses and offering documents has increased exponentially since 1940. Specifically regarding private funds, he noted that the vast number of newly registered advisers after the passage of Dodd-Frank have resulted in a new era of transparency that has been beneficial to both investors and private fund advisers, in addition to the SEC. The public availability of aggregated information has shed light on persistent questions and some misconceptions about the private fund industry. Investors have also benefitted by being able to make more informed choices when investing.
The full remarks are available here.