Short Takes: Mutual Fund Company Offers Price Data Tool

Aim Management Group, a Houston-based mutual fund company, has a new service to help bank trust departments manage customers' records more efficiently.

Aim has set up a computer network designed to transport the daily pricing of its mutual funds directly to a trust department's record keeping system.

Previously, trust officers had to retrieve the daily pricing, then transfer the information themselves to the record keeping department, said Mark McMeans, manager of Aim's institutional operations.

Aim, which manages $29 billion of fund assets, is offering the service through banks that employ M&I Data Services, a Milwaukee-based trust department record keeping vendor that serves medium-sized and large banks. Only banks using M&I have this electronic access.

The computer network "saves a lot of time and reduces the likelihood of error," Mr. McMeans said.