Philippine Mutual Funds and Common Trust Funds: How Different Are They?

Abstract

This study aims to explore the differences between mutual funds (MF) and common trust funds (CTF) in the Philippines.  It is proposed that the differences between these two types of investigations stem principally from differential regulation and taxation.  Removal of these “artificial” sources of differences should result in a CTF investment which has the same risk-expected return profile as a MF investment, despite the different nature of the fiduciary relationship between the CTF issuer and its investor on the one hand, and the shareholder relationship between the MF issuer and its investor on the other.