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A mutual fund is a professionally managed type of collective investment scheme that pools money from many investors and invests it in stocks, bonds, short-term money market instruments, and/or other securities.[1] The mutual fund will have a fund manager that trades the pooled money on a regular basis. Currently, the worldwide value of all mutual funds totals more than $26 trillion. [2] Since 1940, there have been three basic types of investment companies in the United States open-end funds, also known in the US as mutual funds; unit investment trusts (UITs); and closed-end funds. Similar funds also operate in Canada. However, in the rest of the world, mutual fund is used as a generic term for various types of collective investment vehicles, such as unit trusts, open-ended investment companies (OEICs), unitized insurance funds, and undertakings for collective investments in transferable securities (UCITS). Massachusetts Investors Trust (now MFS Investment Management) was founded on March 21, 1924, and, after one year, it had 200 shareholders and $392,000 in assets. The entire industry, which included a few closed-end funds represented less than $10 million in 1924. The stock market crash of 1929 hindered the growth of mutual funds. In response to the stock market crash, Congress passed the Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. These laws require that a fund be registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and provide prospective investors with a prospectus that contains required disclosures about the fund, the securities themselves, and fund manager. The SEC helped draft the Investment Company Act of 1940, which sets forth the guidelines with which all SEC-registered funds today must comply.
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Mutual Fund Subcategories
Mutual Fund Articles
Weekly Markets Toughts - July 29, 2007
by Stefan Penkov
Jul 30, 2007
This is what I call a rock-and-roll week! Anybody scared? You should not! After a good advance of the broader markets these pull-backs are more than normal. The week before, I suggested to take some profits and to forget about the markets until the e...
A bout Investment
by Ganesh Naga
Jan 18, 2007
Investment is an asset with value that is purchased for the purpose of generating income or capital appreciation. When it comes to investment opportunities on the World Wide Web, keep a watchful eye. The Web has many genuine investment opportunitie...
Real Estate Investing: No Lawyers, No Debt, No Plungers
by Steve Selengut
Aug 08, 2006
Real Estate investing is not nearly as legally complicated, financially burdensome, or time consuming as you might think. In fact, it is easy to add raw land, shopping centers, apartment complexes, and private homes to your portfolio without Brokers,...
Retirement and the Roth IRA
by Ronald Hudkins
Jun 12, 2006
Copyright 2006 Ronald Hudkins
An IRA is an IRA is an IRA, unless it?s a Roth IRA. Roth IRAs, which burst upon the investment scene not so long ago, offers some attractive departures from traditional IRAs, especially if it?s being used as a ret...
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