The U.S. Treasury Department announced an extension of its guarantee program for money market funds until April 30, 2009. All money market funds that currently participate in the program and meet the extension requirements are eligible to continue to participate, it said. Funds that currently are not participating in the program are not eligible to enter the program. The temporary guarantee program will continue to provide coverage to shareholders up to amounts that they held in participating money market funds as of the close of business on Sept. 19.

While the program protects the accounts of investors, each money market fund makes the decision to sign-up for the program. Investors cannot sign-up for the program individually. The program currently covers over US$3 trillion of assets.

The Treasury department noted that it may extend the program until Sept. 18, 2009. However, no decision has been made to extend the program beyond April 30, 2009. If a fund does not participate in this extension, that fund will not be eligible to participate in any potential further extension of the program.

Funds must make a program extension payment and submit the extension notice by Dec. 5. The amount of the payment for the extension period will be based on a fund’s net asset value as of Sept. 19. For funds that had a market-based net asset value greater than or equal to 99.75% of their stable share price, the payment will be 0.015%, 1.5 basis points, multiplied by the number of shares outstanding on Sept. 19. For funds that had a market-based net asset value less than 99.75% of their stable share price but greater than or equal to 99.50% of their stable share price, the payment will be 0.022%, 2.2 basis points, multiplied by the number of shares outstanding on Sept. 19.