In the FTFM of 11 March Chris Flood illuminates some style blossoms and collateral damages of the current MiFID regulation. According to MiFID, the fund companies must now also state transaction costs. It is well known that this is difficult in the case of bid-ask spreads. In the process, 3,000 of the 28,600 funds approved achieve zero costs or negative transaction costs according to the methods of the regulators. In addition, asset managers must present future returns for various capital market scenarios. Here, one provider predicts a profit perspective of 523 million percent for its product. Such unrealistic information should confuse retail customers more than help them with their decisions. No wonder that, according to a survey of industry experts, 6 out of 10 respondents came to the result: MiFID causes more harm than good to end consumers.

That fits the picture. In research, too, general confusion still dominates with regard to MiFID. There, however, the error lies less in the regulatory requirements. The challenge here: Many banks have not yet internalised the new understanding of roles. Issuers are asked to pay for their research by the banks, but are often not yet regarded as customers. There is still considerable room for improvement here.