A preliminary prospectus for First Asset/BlackRock North American Dividend Achievers Trust has been filed with the securities regulatory authorities of all the Canadian provinces for an initial public offering of trust units.

The trust will be actively managed by BlackRock Financial Management Inc. with the objective of providing unitholders with monthly cash distributions of 6% per year and to maximize total returns.

The trust’s portfolio will consist primarily of common stocks selected from a universe of Canadian and U.S. issuers known as “Dividend Acheivers” compiled by Mergent, Inc., a leading provider of global business and financial information on publicly traded companies. “Dividend Achievers” are those companies that have a long track record (10 years in the case of U.S. companies and viveryears for Canadian companies) of consecutively increasing their annual regular cash dividends. No leverage will be used in the management of the trust.

BlackRock is a wholly owned subsidiary of BlackRock Inc., one of the largest publicly traded investment management firms in the United States, with approximately US$414 billion of assets under management, at June 30, 2005.

First Asset Funds Inc., the manager of the trust, is an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Affiliated Managers Group, Inc. AMG is a U.S. based asset management holding company with equity investments in a diverse group of mid-sized investment management firms throughout North America and Europe. AMG had assets under management of approximately US$165 billion, at June 30, 2005.

The syndicate of agents for this offering is being led by RBC Capital Markets and CIBC World Markets Inc., and includes National Bank Financial Inc., Scotia Capital Inc., TD Securities Inc., HSBC Securities (Canada) Inc., Blackmont Capital Inc., Canaccord Capital Corp., Desjardins Securities Inc., Dundee Securities Corp., Raymond James Ltd., Research Capital Corp., and Wellington West Capital Inc.