New rules for mutual funds on the way

When people seek fun, stimulating conversations, they don't starttalking about the men and women who serve as directors of mutual fundcompanies.

Directors don't arise in the normal course of cocktail-partychatter. They don't appear as guests on talk shows. You won't readabout them while waiting in supermarket check-out lines. Chancesare, you can't even name one.

But all of this is good because it probably means everything isrunning smoothly at your fund company. Usually, the only time youever hear about directors is when something bad happens. In terms ofmutual fund governance, no news is good news.

But change is in the air. Arthur Levitt, chairman of …