Dalbar announced today that Toronto-based BMO Mutual Funds has captured the company’s 2006 Mutual Fund Service Award, given to the Canadian mutual fund company that provides the best overall service to its investors over the calendar year.

This marks the first year that BMO has won the award, after several years of the company placing very highly in Dalbar's annual rankings.  Other top-quartile finishers in 2006 were Franklin Templeton Investments, AIC Limited, and AIM Trimark Investments.

Mutual fund account statements are similar in quality in 2006 than they were two years earlier, according to findings of a recent study conducted by research firm Dalbar.

The study evaluated account statements from 22 of Canada’s largest mutual fund companies.  It identifies improvements in how statements inform investors of their capital gains during the year, avoid irrelevant information, and in their overall aesthetics.  However, it also states that the industry has been slow to evolve in areas such as providing investors with a percentage rate of return for their portfolios and telling investors how they can access information on their holdings via the Internet.