Putnam Investments announced Monday a free Web-based tool for both computer and iPad advisor users that allows financial advisors from broker-dealers to compare data on the mutual fund universe using 60 different criteria.
While Putnam executives interviewed on Friday stressed that the FundVisualizer is not a fund screener, they also said that the tool will be enhanced with additional features over time based on user feedback. Among those enhancements are likely to be a version for RIAs and a version for end clients.
Advisors can access the FundVisualizer tool through Putnam’s advisor website following registration, and using data licensed from Morningstar, can create visual comparisons of multiple mutual funds from a universe of more than 10,000 funds across asset classes, cap size, load and no-load and mutual fund families, not just Putnam funds, and display them for client use, if desired. A button also allows users to download the prospectuses of specific funds. Using a drag-and-drop approach, the advisor user can create the comparisons as tables and save to a chart library that’s stored in their online repository for future use.
The iPad version of the tool uses an optimized version of the Safari web browser, with charts saved onto the iPad itself.