MutualFundWire.com: Big Fund Firms Spend Big Lobbying Bucks
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Friday, March 11, 2011

Big Fund Firms Spend Big Lobbying Bucks


Some of the biggest names in asset management are reportedly lending their voices and wallets to counteract the wave of regulation besetting the $25.6 trillion asset-management industry.

BlackRock [see profile] spent some $1.7 million on lobbying in 2010, the Wall Street Journal reports, citing data from OpenSecrets.org, a nonprofit group that tracks lobbying data, up from $390,000 the year before and zero in 2006. Not to be outdone, Fidelity Investments Co. [see profile] parent FMR Corp. increased its spending 21 percent last year to $3.5 million and Legg Mason Inc. [see profile] coughed up $1.07 million last year, up from $580,000 in 2009.

Also, Vanguard Group Inc. [see profile] spent $1.2 million in lobbying expenses last year, which is more than double the firm's expense in 2006. Vanguard and BlackRock reportedly donated $394,000 and $129,000, respectively, to Democrats and Republicans, and Legg Mason donated a total of $13,000 to a Democrat and a political action committee.

Ann Combs, who heads Vanguard's government-relations efforts and Mike Alfred, co-founder and chief executive of BrightScope (a 401(k) analytics and benchmarking specialist), both weighed in on the topic.


Printed from: MFWire.com/story.asp?s=36238

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