They will not make any person get a money market fund ; in reality they could make both stockholders and some fund corporations question why they're troubling with cash funds at all. Money funds, often, are the investment carpark, the place where folk put money, looking to keep it safe and earn a smidge of return while searching for the following opportunity. Yields are low due to what money funds buy. Stock market volatility and fears over credit quality sent stockholders heading to Treasurys, dropping yields on central authority debt to their lowest levels in half a century and making it tricky for money bosses to supply any return . Late in 2008, the breakdown of Lehman Bros wrecked some short term paper issued by the company, which was sufficient to create a speculator panic in cash funds that had the notes. Some firms, most significantly the Vanguard Group, have gone as far as to shut money funds because they do not think they can operate gainfully in the existing environment. At least 30 percent of a money fund's assets must be in readies or Treasurys that mature in sixty days or less, or that may be converted into money inside a week. The very good news is that any financier troubling about the credit safety of giant banks and financial companies -- and allegedly everyone seems to be concerned about those things given the prevailing worldwide money disorder -- can expect cash funds to hold less paper from the financial sector. The top-yielding cash market funds now are creating virtually nothing for investors, with the best individual cash funds paying out less than 0.2% and the top tax free funds creating about 0.25%, according to Crane Info , which tracks the money-fund business.

they are not exactly excellent for the consumer either. A stockholder with $100,000 in readies to park will earn about $3.50 a day in a web saving account paying 1.3%, but will earn just 35 cents each day on a money fund paying 0.13%. The returns are unhappy in both cases, but the additional $1,150 -- and the positive of having Fed Deposit Insurance Co protection -- is worth leaving the cash fund. In time, when IRs begin to rise again and money fund bosses have options for juicing returns, the new security precautions might pay off and protect investors. There may come a day when investors look back and recognize how smart the changes are but -- even with the prevailing financial disaster and concerns -- that day will not come shortly.