Ever been in a board room debate about growing too fast? A fund company executive shared the heated discussion that took place at her firm's last executive meeting.

The annual Schwab IMPACT Conference was held last week in San Diego. It’s a four-day gathering of RIAs and the firms providing investment products and services to this important investor category.

Market uncertainty and a bizarre presidential administration have made some financial advisors, and their clients, a bit anxious. Here are what some mutual fund companies are doing to help alleviate some of that anxiety.

And, what they don't want!

So, you are a fund company and you are trying to figure out what financial advisors truly want and don’t want.  You want these advisors to tell their clients to buy your fund.  

I signed a Divestment Pledge so there’s no chance my investments could be going to the wrong people…right? So you’ve signed the divestment pledge, vowing to avoid investments in the top fossil fuel producers. 

Fund firms are likely to face downward pressure on fees, as well as fewer mutual fund share classes, based on the Department of Labor’s (DOL) fiduciary rule, according to a recent story in Investment News. 

When launching a new fund, there are myriad considerations. Perhaps the most critical is whether investors will be interested. We are pleased to share our review of another research paper by Morningstar: The Rise and Fall of New Funds, Why Some Funds Succeed and Others Don't.  

Morningstar's 30 plus page research report concludes that “investors really do respond to a wide spectrum of information about mutual funds when making their investment decisions. Data on past performance, investment recommendations, firm quality, management continuity, fund structure, style tilts, and fees all have meaningful impacts on investor behavior."

Another helping hand never hurts.

Growing a mutual fund in this day and age can be a daunting task. With hundreds of thousands of funds out there, it can be nearly impossible to stand out and draw investors to your fund. 

Morningstar recently announced changes to its Morningstar Analyst Ratings system, now applying this forward-looking rating to ETFs. In addition, ETFs will now be combined into the same relevant peer group alongside mutual funds for the traditional Morningstar one to five-star rating calculated quantitatively using backward-looking performance and risk data.