Money Management Executive Announces Winners of 2008 Fund Operations Awards: J.P. Morgan, PNC, Principal Financial Take Top Honors

J.P. Morgan Investor Services, PNC and Principal Financial have been honored with first-place for Leadership, Innovation and Efficiencies/Streamlining, respectively, in Money Management Executive's 2008 Fund Operations Awards.

Published by SourceMedia, Money Management Executive is the leading print publication devoted to the retail asset management industry.

Now in its sixth year, the awards program recognizes outstanding investment management service providers. As in previous years, the judges for the program noted significant technological strides and achievements that the industry continues to make, particularly in the areas of automation and straight-through-processing.

The following nine winners, below, were selected by a panel of seven leading executives in the industry, including: T. Neil Bathon, managing director of PMR Associates and founder of FUSE Research Network; Peter Delano, research area director, securities and investments at TowerGroup; Ian Frost, senior partner at Boston Consulting Group; Bob Goldberg, president emeritus of NICSA and consultant with Acadient; Burt Greenwald, president of B.J. Greenwald Associates; Charlie O'Neill, principal of Diversified Management Resources Financial; and Kathleen Whalen, managing director, Dalbar.

Leadership

1st Place Winner, Leadership -- Tom Hierl, Director of U.S. Funds Taxation at J.P. Morgan Investor Services

Serving in this position since August 2006, Tom Hierl and his U.S. Funds Taxation team have presided over tremendous growth in the number of funds for which J.P. Morgan Investor Services provides U.S. tax services, which have risen from 350 to 850. To manage this expansion, J.P. Morgan is implementing automated processes that previously were handled manually, including the production of tax provisions and returns. J.P. Morgan Investor Services currently has $14.4 trillion in assets under custody and $5.4 trillion under administration.

2nd Place Winner, Leadership -- Larry H. Goldbrum, Executive Vice President and General Counsel at RG Wuelfing & Associates and the SPARK Institute

As an active industry leader, Larry H. Goldbrum worked with the Securities and Exchange Commission in developing Rule 22c-2 to detect and prevent market timing or other trading abuses, as well as with other regulatory agencies on a number of initiatives to better serve investors, including fee disclosure, fair funds settlement payments and materials to help the 403(b) plan community comply with new regulations taking effect in January 2009.

3rd Place Winner, Leadership -- Keith F. Hartstein, President and Chief Executive Officer of John Hancock Funds

Keith F. Hartstein set an example with this year's liquidity freeze in closed-end auction-rate preferred shares. Working with John Hancock Funds' board of directors and a broad constituency of senior management from both John Hancock and Manulife Financial, as well as the Investment Company Institute and the Securities and Exchange Commission, Hartstein was able to develop, implement and successfully execute a plan that solved the difficult challenge of providing much-needed liquidity to auction-rate preferred shareholders without negatively impacting the interests of common shareholders.

To date, John Hancock remains the only major asset management firm to have completely refinanced all of its closed-end auction rate preferred shares.

Innovation

1st Place, Innovation -- PNC

PNC is being awarded First Place, Innovation, for its ADVISORport unified managed account platform. Web-based, customizable and available for sponsors to white label, the secure online platform allows financial advisers to make timely changes to clients' portfolios on an ongoing basis, thereby eliminating processing concerns and investment delay risks. Thus, the UMA account is streamlined, can be offered to a broader client base and has the potential to attract more assets.

2nd Place, Innovation -- J.P. Morgan Investor Services

Recognizing the increasing popularity of exchange-traded funds, J.P. Morgan Investor Services' Exchange-Traded Fund Product Development and Operations Team expanded the capabilities of its ETF platform so that clients may offer not just equity ETFs, but also those that invest in fixed income, enhanced indexes, inverse indexes, enhanced inverse indexes, international and emerging markets derivative products and 130/30 strategies. They also expanded capabilities to offer servicing for ETFs outside the United States.

Of particular concern was the ability to offer clients shortened settlement, cash settlement, customized intraday valuation, cash component forecasting, restricted securities implications and cash in lieu of processing.

3rd Place, Innovation -- BNY Mellon Asset Servicing

BNY Mellon is the recipient of Third Place, Innovation, for expanding its exchange-traded fund servicing beyond fund accounting, administration, custody and transfer agency services to include automated basket creation and dissemination, and order-desk services.

These technologies have added 800 basis points of operating leverage by significantly reducing the headcount to service ETFs. It has also led to an 80% win rate in new business opportunities. All told, this is driving a top-line revenue growth increase of 40% year-over-year.