The Canadian Investment Funds Standards Committee (CIFSC) has named Rudy Luukko as chairman of the committee.

Luukko, a founding member of the committee, takes over as head of the private-sector committee effective January 1, when the CIFSC will will begin its eighth year of operations.

Luukko, whose appointment was confirmed at the monthly CIFSC meeting held on December 21, will take over from John Campea, the 2004 chair.

Campea said the highlights of the year included the release of the CIFSC categories for institutional pooled funds, and the establishment of five category sub-committees, each responsible for recommending improvements to the CIFSC’s current set of 35 standard categories.

“The subcommittees identified numerous changes that are necessary to reflect changes in the marketplace,” said Campea, who is product manager, data services, at Morningstar Canada. “With the proliferation of diversified income-oriented funds, and the blurring of the lines between balanced and other categories, new criteria and in some cases new categories are needed to better define appropriate peer groups.”

Luukko, who is Morningstar Canada’s investment funds editor, says no category changes will be implemented during the current RRSP season, but that he expects a major overhaul to be implemented by mid-2005.

“Among the new categories will be one called Canadian Income Balanced, which will focus on the growing number of diversified funds that make income distributions at least quarterly,” said Luukko. “I expect that we will also be tightening up the criteria for Canadian Income Trust funds, and imposing significantly stricter requirements on the equity exposure of funds that we place in our fixed income categories.”

Other issues that the new chairman expects will be continuing concerns for CIFSC in the new year include how past performance should be reported for new classes of a fund, the accurate and timely reporting of management expense ratios, and the impact of fund mergers on performance history.