The Capital Group Companies The Capital Group Companies is one of the world’s largest and most successful investment management organizations. As measured by assets under management, it rivals Fidelity Investments, but little is known about it because the company has shunned publicity and photographers. The firm was founded in the dark year of 1931 by Jonathan Bell Lovelace, who emerged almost unscathed from the market crash and subsequent depression.

It is headquartered in Los Angeles, California and has offices in 21 locations around the globe. Its family of funds include: "American Funds" and "Capital International Funds." It also engages in private equity investments for the affluent. One of its subsiduaries, Capital International, was responsible for the construction of the MSCI stock market indices.

The American Funds, managed by the Capital Group Companies, marched past Fidelity Investments in 2005 in total managed assets through September - $738 billion for American Funds, $716 billion for Fidelity. The company is on track next year to topple Vanguard ($774 billion), which rode the popularity of index funds to surpass Fidelity in 2003. American Funds has quietly and unassumingly become home to six of the 10 largest stock funds in the U.S. - including the biggest of them all, the $117 billion Growth Fund of America. More than $1 of every $3 plunked into a fund these days goes to American Funds. Vanguard gets about $1 of every $5; Fidelity just $1 of every $50.

External links

• Capital International Funds website
• Capital Group website
• American Funds website
• Capital: The Story of Long-Term Investment Excellence (John Wiley & Sons, 2004) (ISBN 0471567043) by Charles D. Ellis. Book profiling the Capital Group Companies.

Investment management companies | Companies based in Los Angeles | Mutual fund families | Privately held companies