Dear Morningstar Clients,
This e-mail contains Morningstar Data Release Notes for September 2003. As always, we invite your comments and questions on our communications, products and services. Please contact any member of your account team. Thank you.
Your Morningstar Team
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Morningstar(R) Data Release Notes - September 2003
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*New Foreign Style-Based Categories
As previously communicated, effective September 30, Morningstar will introduce five new style-based foreign categories to help investors differentiate between the many foreign stock funds now available. These five new categories will replace the current Foreign Stock category across all data universes. The categories and letter codes are as follows: Foreign Large Value-FV; Foreign Large Blend-FB; Foreign Large Growth-FG; Foreign Small/Mid Value-FA; Foreign Small/Mid Growth-FR. New foreign categories can be viewed on our websites on the third business day of the month, which is October 3.
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Recap of Previous Announcements
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*Tax Rate Changes
The Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003 calls for different tax treatments for qualified dividends and new tax rates for income, dividends, and capital gains. Morningstar will begin using the new tax rates in our November 30 after-tax calculations. The November 30 launch will also include new quarter-end returns (up through September 30) that are based on the new tax rates.
*Change to Best-Fit Index
Effective August 1, we began using the Citigroup Emerging Market Sovereign Bond Index - Capped Brady index (Citigroup ESBI-Capped Brady) in place of the Citigroup Emerging Market Mutual Fund index, which was discontinued.
*Morningstar Rating(TM) Methodology
The enhanced Morningstar Rating(TM) methodology introduced for open-end funds last summer was applied to closed-end funds effective with August month-end processing. The enhanced methodology was applied to our variable annuity/life data earlier this year. If you would like more details on the Morningstar Rating methodology, please contact your account team.
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News from Morningstar
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*FactSet User Conference
Our research director, Paul Kaplan, will address the topic of holdings- and returns-based style analysis at the upcoming user conference in Atlanta, November 6-8.
*National Association for Variable Annuities Annual Meeting
Stop by and see us at booth 216/218 at the NAVA Annual Meeting, October 19-21 in Washington DC. Morningstar is pleased to have provided NAVA with data to update the PriceWaterhouseCoopers/National Economic Consulting study comparing systematic withdrawal to annuitization, which will be released at the Annual Meeting. Please contact NAVA if you would like a copy of the study, http://www.navanet.org .
*Investment Management Consultants Association - Money Management Expo
We hope to see you at booth 1800 at the Investment Management Consultants Association - 2003 Fall Money Management Exposition, October 2-4 in Dallas.
*New York-area DataLab(R) Users Forum
Our first New York Users Forum will be held on October 30 at the Warwick Hotel. We are pleased that several of our clients have agreed to share their knowledge and experience with other DataLab users. The agenda will also include a presentation on holdings- versus returns-based style analysis by our research director, Paul Kaplan. If you would like to attend, please contact Lisa Bowling via e-mail at lisa.bowling@morningstar.com or call Lisa at 312 384 3877. Please RSVP by October 15.
*529 Back to School Sale!
Take advantage of our introductory-rate discounts on 529 data products, including Licensed Data, Investment Profiles (both PDF and web-based formats) and Internet Content and Tools. Provide investors with the information they need to make good decisions. Support your communications initiatives with plan, portfolio and underlying investment data, along with Morningstar proprietary statistics. Ask your Morningstar representative for more information.
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