Method of searching and classifying funds

• US 20070299785A1
• Filed: 06/23/2006
• Published: 12/27/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 06/23/2006
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Dylan Tullberg
• Original Assignee: Dylan Tullberg
• Inventors: Tullberg, Dylan
• Application Number:
  US11/473,854
• Publication Number:
  US 20070299785A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/36.00R
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/06 Asset management; Financial planning or analysis

Abstract

A method of searching and classifying of funds and their related investment information, especially for online use, involving: providing a software program for facilitating performance of a search; providing a fields list; and providing a starting list, the search being of a type such as a user-provided holdings comparison and a user-defined category search, the fields list providing step involving a plurality of tables, each table having a data set concerning individual publicly traded funds, the tables providing step involving the data set including at least one data item such as a plurality of holding names, a plurality of holding types, a plurality of fund types, a plurality of ticker symbols, a plurality of international securities identification numbers, a plurality of share numbers, and a plurality of categories, the starting list providing step involving a step such as manually entering information, uploading information from a spreadsheet, and selecting information from the data set, the data set providing step involving the plurality of holding types as a stock, a bond, and a stock option, and the data set providing step involving the plurality of fund types such as a mutual fund, an index fund, an exchange-traded fund.

Claims

1. A method of searching and classifying funds, comprising the steps of:

providing a software program for facilitating performance of at least one search;

providing a fields list; and

providing a starting list.

2. A method, as recited in claim 1, wherein the at least one search is selected from a group consisting essentially of a user-provided holdings comparison and a user-defined category search.

3. A method, as recited in claim 1, wherein the fields list providing step comprises the step of providing a plurality of tables, each table having a data set concerning individual publicly traded funds.

4. A method, as recited in claim 1, wherein the tables providing step comprising the step of providing the data set to include at least one data item being selected from a group consisting essentially of a plurality of holding names, a plurality of holding types, a plurality of fund types, a plurality of ticker symbols, a plurality of international securities identification numbers, a plurality of share numbers, and a plurality of categories.

5. A method, as recited in claim 1, wherein the starting list providing step comprises at least one step being selected from a group consisting essentially of:

manually entering information;

uploading information from a spreadsheet; and

selecting information from the data set.

6. A method, as recited in claim 4, wherein the data set providing step comprises providing the plurality of holding types as at least one holding type selected from a group consisting essentially of a stock, a bond, and a stock option.

7. A method, as recited in claim 4, wherein the data set providing step comprises providing the plurality of fund types as at least one fund type being selected from a group consisting essentially of a mutual fund, an index fund, an exchange-traded fund.

8. A method of searching and classifying funds, comprising the steps of:

providing a software program for facilitating performance of at least one search;

providing a fields list; and

providing a starting list,

wherein the at least one search is selected from a group consisting essentially of a user-provided holdings comparison and a user-defined category search,

wherein the fields list providing step comprises the step of providing a plurality of tables, each table having a data set concerning individual publicly traded funds,

wherein the tables providing step comprising the step of providing the data set to include at least one data item being selected from a group consisting essentially of a plurality of holding names, a plurality of holding types, a plurality of fund types, a plurality of ticker symbols, a plurality of international securities identification numbers, a plurality of share numbers, and a plurality of categories,

wherein the starting list providing step comprises at least one step being selected from a group consisting essentially of;

manually entering information;

uploading information from a spreadsheet; and

selecting information from the data set,

wherein the data set providing step comprises providing the plurality of holding types as at least one holding type selected from a group consisting essentially of a stock, a bond, and a stock option, and

wherein the data set providing step comprises providing the plurality of fund types as at least one fund type being selected from a group consisting essentially of a mutual fund, an index fund, an exchange-traded fund.

9. A method of searching and classifying funds, comprising the steps of:

providing a software program;

entering a list selected from a group consisting essentially of a list of holdings and a list of industry categories into the software program by a user;

searching a database for an item matching the list using the software program, thereby performing a search, and thereby generating search results; and

sorting the search results using the software program, thereby generating a sorted list in a descending matching order.

10. A method, as recited in claim 9, wherein the holdings list comprises at least one of the user'"'"'s designated publicly traded companies.

11. A method, as recited in claim 9, wherein the list entering step comprises using an online fillable form.

12. A method, as recited in claim 9, wherein the item comprises an element selected from a group consisting essentially of a single fund holding or an industry category.

13. A method, as recited in claim 9, further comprising the step of presenting options to the user for limiting a scope of the search, wherein the scope limiting options comprising fund criteria, the fund criteria comprising at least one element selected from a group consisting essentially of a ratio of any item in relation to a fund, a fund type, a fund expense, a fund net asset value, fund performance data, a minimum initial investment, a front-end load, a purchase fee, a back-end load, an exchange fee, an account fee, fund annual operating expenses, a date for a most recent update, a total expense ratio, and an entity name associated with performing the update.

14. A method, as recited in claim 13, wherein the fund type comprises an element selected from a group consisting essentially of an exchange-traded fund and an index fund.

15. A method, as recited in claim 9, further comprising the step of providing the user with an option for initially designating a parameter selected from a group consisting essentially of a preference and a weight with respect to each holding in the holdings list.

16. A method, as recited in claim 15,

wherein the preference comprises a hierarchy of importance in an order of the holdings list, and

wherein the weight comprises a percentage assigned to each holding in the holdings list.

17. A method, as recited in claim 15, further comprising the step of assigning a desired percentage of importance for each holding by the software program.

18. A method, as recited in claim 15,

wherein the software program accommodates three user levels, and

wherein the three user levels comprise software for an accommodation for a regular user, an accommodation for a fund manager, and an accommodation for a fund program administrator.

19. A method, as recited in claim 18,

wherein the regular user accommodation facilitates performing a fund holding search and performing a category search,

wherein the fund manager accommodation facilitates performing a fund holding search, performing category search, and providing a fund information editing option,

the fund information editing option comprising:

a feature for editing a holding name, a share amount, a category name, and a category amount;

a feature for uploading a spreadsheet containing current fund data; and

a feature for manually editing individual fund data via an online fillable form and submission technique, and

wherein the fund program administrator accommodation facilitates performing a fund holding search, performing a category search, providing a fund information editing option, and providing a user-information editing option,

the fund information editing option comprising;

a feature for editing a holding name, a share amount, a category name, and a category amount;

a feature for uploading a spreadsheet containing current fund data; and

a feature for manually editing individual fund data via an online fillable form and submission technique,

the user-information editing option comprising;

a feature for adding user information;

a feature for deleting user information; and

a feature for editing user information.

20. A method, as recited in claim 9, further comprising the step of collecting data, thereby generating collected data, the collected data comprising at least one element selected from a group consisting essentially of data from corporate quarterly filings that are required by the Securities and Exchange Commission, data from third-party sources, and updateable data from authorized fund management personnel.

21. A method, as recited in claim 20,

wherein the corporate quarterly filings data comprises information gleaned, via a computer, from an Securities and Exchange Commission Form N-Q, the gleaned Form N-Q data being subsequently manually editable for use by the software program,

wherein third-party source data comprises real-time information gleaned from at least one third-party source selected from a group consisting essentially of a Lipper™

service, a Reuters™

service, and a Morningstar™

service, the gleaned third-party source data being in compliance with federal securities regulations, and

wherein the updateable data comprises new data being collected, old data being archived in the database, and interim data being gleaned by directly updating the old data, the interim data comprising at least one element selected from a group consisting essentially of intra-quarterly data, manually gathered data from most recently posted corporate data and a corporate web site.

22. A method, as recited in claim 21, further comprising the step of providing at least one comparison in fund metrics as a function of a plurality of dates using the archived data.

23. A method as recited in claim 9, further comprising a step selected from a group consisting of authorizing a user and registering a user.