IA Clarington Investments Inc. today announced several changes aimed at streamlining and simplifying its fund lineup while providing greater cost efficiency for investors.

Among the proposed changes, the company is seeking approval to merge nine mutual funds into other mutual funds managed by IA Clarington. It also intends to transition portfolio management responsibilities for two funds, reduce management fees on three funds, close two small funds, and align commission schedules across its fund line-up.

“These changes will streamline and simplify our fund family, providing investors and advisors with a clearer set of investment choices,” said David Scandiffio, president of IA Clarington. “We are moving forward with a more focused lineup, which combines strong internal investment management capabilities with products from leading external money managers from Canada and abroad.”

IA Clarington is proposing the following mergers:

  • Clarington Money Market Fund into R Money Market Fund;
  • Clarington Canadian Bond Fund into R Bond Fund;
  • R High Yield Bond Fund into R Bond Fund;
  • IA Clarington Dividend Income Fund into R Dividend Income Fund;
  • IA Clarington Canadian Conservative Equity Fund into IA Canadian Conservative Equity Fund;
  • R Global Growth Fund into Clarington Global Equity Fund;
  • R European Fund into Clarington Global Equity Fund;
  • R Asian Fund into Clarington Global Equity Fund; and
  • R Life & Health Fund into Clarington Global Equity Fund.

At the time of the mergers, R Money Market Fund and R Bond Fund willbe renamed IA Money Market Fund and IA Bond Fund, respectively.

Concurrent with the fund mergers, the IA Clarington intends to transition portfolio management responsibilities for the Clarington Diversified Income Fund and the Clarington Income Trust Fund to Industrial Alliance Investment Management Inc. (IAIM). The investment objectives and strategies of the two funds will not change.

“IAIM has very strong capabilities and a proven track record in managing equity income portfolios,” said Eric Frape, vp, product management of IA Clarington “We believe investors in these funds will benefit from this expertise, and from a more cost-efficient fee structure that will be realized through the change.”

IA Clarington also intends to reduce the management fees on Series A units of the Clarington Diversified Income Fund and the Clarington Income Trust Fund to 2.00%. Based on the current cost structures of the funds, the management expense ratio of each fund is expected to decrease by about 10 basis points or 0.10%.

It also plans to reduce the management fee on the Series A units of the Clarington Global Equity fund to 2.00%. Based on the fund’s current cost structure, this is expected to reduce the MER of the fund by 27 basis points to 2.53%.

All fee changes will take effect on November 17.

As part of the full integration of the Industrial Alliance Fund Management Inc. and ClaringtonFunds Inc. product lineups, the company is making changes to its low load schedules and deferred sales charge (“DSC”) schedules so that there is a consistent structure applicable to all the funds. These changes will impact all purchases made after November 17,. Existing assets will be subject to the fee schedule in effect at the time of purchase.

Going forward, IA Claringto will use the low load sales commission and redemption fee structure applied to the R and IA funds. The Company also announced it will increase the sales commission paid to dealers on sales of low load units from 2.25% to 2.50%.

To align the DSC schedules, the company is adopting the DSC redemption fee schedule currently applied to Clarington funds. In addition, IA Clarington announced that the trailer rate on DSC units purchased after November 17 will automatically change to the front end rate upon completion of the redemption schedule.

IA Clarington also announced its decision to close two small funds on or shortly following November 17, 2006: IA Crystal Enhanced Index America Fund and Clarington Canadian Resources Class. The decision to close the funds was made due to their small size and the company’s assessment of their future asset growth potential. Each of the two funds has less than $3 million in assets.

The funds will be closed to new purchases effective16:00 ET on September 15. Securityholders may redeem or switch their holdings in each of the funds until the close of business on November 17. Any remaining securities on November 17 will be redeemed and the proceeds distributed to securityholders.

At a special meeting to be held on November 10, IA Clarington will be asking investors in the merging funds to approve the proposed mergers. If the mergers are approved by mutual fund investors and receive regulatory approval, they will occur on November 17.

@page_break@Effective 16:00 ET on September 15, the merging funds will be closed to new purchases, except for purchases under existing systematic plans and redirected distributions. Existing systematic plans on the merging funds will carry over to the continuing funds following the mergers.