Governance Highlights from Deloitte's Fair Valuation Survey

Deloitte’s 17^th annual fair valuation survey, which will be discussed in an upcoming MFDF webinar, delivers the latest data on the valuation landscape. Among the survey’s findings: investment companies have been slow to adopt technology such as AI in the valuation process for various reasons including costs and use cases; and mutual funds are increasingly including private equity investments in their portfolios. On the governance front, Deloitte finds:

• In the last 12 months, 26 percent of survey participants, up slightly from last year, noted that the board held a valuation discussion with management, outside of a regularly scheduled meeting, to address a valuation matter or question.
• The percentage of survey participants with valuation policies and procedures that explicitly require that one or more board members “must be involved” and/or “must be notified” in the resolution of a valuation matter increased slightly from 45 percent to 48 percent.
• Seventy-four percent of survey participants reported that their boards receive price challenge information, compared to 67 percent last year and 40 percent in our survey conducted in 2013.

Representatives from Deloitte will delve into the survey results in an MFDF webinar on December 10, 2019.