LONDON (Reuters) - A panel that advises the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has suggested that money managers be asked to disclose the full cost they charge to manage a total of 5 trillion pounds of capital in Britain.
The Financial Services Consumer Panel said money managers could be required to come up with a single annual charge. All other costs currently charged by them directly from the fund would be borne by the investment management firm.
"These costs have a significant impact on returns, but new research commissioned by the Panel suggests that retail customers do not know what costs they will face when they invest," the panel said in a statement on Monday.
The panel said that the annual management charges disclosed by money managers currently might represent as little as a quarter of the actual costs because investment managers deduct many other hidden charges directly from the fund.
It said a single number disclosing all the costs would help investors compare different rates and also encourage money managers to become more efficient.
"Poor disclosure, weak governance and multiple conflicts of interest mean that competition in the investment market is not working in the best interests of consumers," Sue Lewis, chairman of the panel said in the statement.
Britain's fund management industry in 2013 managed assets worth 5 trillion pounds, data from the Investment Management Association showed. Roughly 1 trillion pounds of that came from retail investors and 1.4 trillion pounds from pension funds.
(Reporting by Nishant Kumar; editing by Keith Weir)