Form N-PORT Supporting Statement

OMB CONTROL NUMBER: 3235-0730
SUPPORTING STATEMENT
For the Paperwork Reduction Act Information Collection Submission for
Rule 30b1-9 and Form N-PORT
A.

JUSTIFICATION
1.

Necessity for the Information Collection

Section 30(b) of the Investment Company Act of 1940 [15 U.S.C. 80a-30(b)]
(“Act”) provides that “[e]very registered investment company shall file with the
Commission…such information, documents, and reports (other than financial
statements), as the Commission may require to keep reasonably current the information
and documents contained in the registration statement of such company…” Final rule
30b1-9 under the Act [17 CFR 270.30b1-9], entitled “Monthly Report,” provides that
each registered management investment company or exchange-traded fund organized as a
unit investment trust, or series thereof, other than a registered open-end management
investment company that is regulated as a money market fund under rule 2a-7 [17 CFR

270.2a-7] or a small business investment company registered on Form N-5 [17 CFR 239.24
and 274.5], must file a monthly report of portfolio holdings on Form N-PORT [17 CFR
274.150], current as of the last business day, or last calendar day, of the month. 1

Form N-PORT requires funds to report portfolio holdings information in a
structured, XML format. The form is filed electronically using the Commission’s
electronic filing system (Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis and Retrieval or
“EDGAR”). Consistent with the current portfolio disclosure regime, only information
reported for the third month of each fund’s fiscal quarter on Form N-PORT is made

1

See Investment Company Reporting Modernization, Investment Company Act Release No. 32314
(October 16, 2016) (“Reporting Modernization Adoption”).

publicly available, and such information is not made public until 60 days after the end of
the third month of the fund’s fiscal quarter. This approach is intended to minimize the
harm of free-riding and front running activity that might occur with more frequent or rapid
public disclosure. On June 28, 2018, the Commission adopted amendments to Form N-

PORT to rescind the requirement that funds publicly disclose their aggregate liquidity
profile on a quarterly basis with a 60-day delay, to add an additional disclosure
requirement relating to the fund's and other registrant's holdings of cash and cash
equivalents not reported in Parts C and D of the Form, and to allow funds the option of
splitting a fund's holding into more than one classification category in three specified
circumstances. 2 We believe these additional amendments enhance, the liquidity data
reported to the Commission. In addition, for some funds, these changes may also reduce
cost burdens as they comply with the rule.
2.

Purpose and Use of the Information Collection

The title for the collection of information is: Rule 30b1-9 and Form N-PORT.
The information provided in reports on Form N-PORT will be used by the Commission
in its regulatory, disclosure review, inspection, and policymaking roles. Unlike many
other federal information collections, which are primarily for the use and benefit of the
collecting agency, this information collection will also be for the use and benefit of
investors. The Commission will make information reported for the third month of each
fund’s fiscal quarter on Form N-PORT publicly available.

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3.

Consideration Given to Information Technology

The Commission’s EDGAR electronic filing system is designed to automate the
filing, processing and dissemination of full disclosure filings. The system permits filers
to transmit filings to the Commission electronically. This automation has increased the
speed, accuracy and availability of information, generating benefits to investors and
financial markets. Reports on Form N-PORT are filed with the Commission
electronically on EDGAR. The public may access filings on EDGAR through the
Commission’s Internet Web site (http://www.sec.gov) or at EDGAR terminals located at
the Commission’s public reference rooms.
4.

Duplication

The Commission periodically evaluates rule-based reporting and recordkeeping
requirements for duplication, and reevaluates them whenever it proposes a rule or a
change in a rule. The information collection required by the amendments to Form NPORT is not duplicated elsewhere.
5.

Effect on Small Entities

The requirements for reports on Form N-PORT will not distinguish between small
entities and other funds in terms of what information will be required to be reported,
including the information required by the amendments. The Commission believes that
imposing different reporting requirements on smaller funds will not be consistent with
investor protection and the purposes of portfolio holdings reports. Differing reporting
requirements will not provide comparable information about portfolio holdings held by

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small entities and other funds that could be used by Commission staff to identify trends
and outliers and by investors to make informed investment decisions.
The Commission reviews all rules periodically, as required by the Regulatory
Flexibility Act, to identify methods to minimize recordkeeping or reporting requirements
affecting small entities.
6.

Consequences of Not Conducting Collection

Funds are required to file reports on Form N-PORT with the Commission no later
than 30 days after the end of each month. Less frequent collection would mean that
current information will not be available to the Commission.
7.

Inconsistencies with Guidelines in 5 CFR 1320.5(d)(2)

Rule 30b1-9 requires funds to submit reports on Form N-PORT on a monthly
basis. Given the rapidly changing composition of fund portfolios, monthly reports are
necessary to ensure that the Commission receives timely and accurate portfolio holdings
information.
8.

Consultation Outside the Agency

The Commission and the staff of the Division of Investment Management
participate in an ongoing dialogue with representatives of the investment company
industry through public conferences, meetings, and informal exchanges. These various
forums provide the Commission and the staff with a means of ascertaining and acting
upon paperwork burdens confronting the industry.
9.

Payment or Gift

Not applicable.
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10.

Confidentiality

Not applicable.
11.

Sensitive Questions

No information of a sensitive nature, including social security numbers, will be
required under this collection of information. The information collection collects basic
Personally Identifiable Information (PII) that may include names, job titles, work
addresses and telephone numbers. However, the agency has determined that the
information collection does not constitute a system of record for purposes of the Privacy
Act. Information is not retrieved by a personal identifier. In accordance with Section
208 of the E-Government Act of 2002, the agency has conducted a Privacy Impact
Assessment (PIA) of the EDGAR system, in connection with this collection of
information. The EDGAR PIA, published on 1/29/2016, is provided as a supplemental
document and is also available at https://www.sec.gov/privacy.
12.

Burden of Information Collection

The following estimates of average burden hours and costs are made solely for
purposes of the Paperwork Reduction Act (“PRA”) (44 U.S.C. 3501 et seq.) and are not
derived from a comprehensive or even representative survey or study of the cost of the
Commission rules and forms.
Preparing reports of portfolio holdings on Form N-PORT is mandatory for all
management investment companies (other than money market funds and small business
investment companies) and UITs that operate as ETFs and is a collection of information
under the PRA. We estimate that 11980 entities will be required to submit reports on
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Form N-PORT. We estimate that 35% of funds will file reports on Form N-PORT in
house and the remaining 65% of funds will retain the services of a third party to prepare
and file reports on Form N-PORT on the fund's behalf.
The information required by Form N-PORT must be data-tagged in XML format.
Responses to the reporting requirements will be kept confidential, subject to the
provisions of applicable law, for reports filed with respect to the first two months of each
quarter; the third month of the quarter will not be kept confidential, but made public 60
days after the quarter end, unless otherwise stated in the form. Form N-PORT is designed
to assist the Commission its regulatory, disclosure review, inspection, and policymaking
roles, and to help investors and other market participants better assess different fund
products.
Beginning in 2022, Form N-PORT will also require funds that are limited
derivatives users to report information about derivatives exposure, including the number
of business days that a fund’s derivatives exposure exceeds 10% of its net assets during
the reporting period. 3 We estimate that 2,437 funds will be subject to this exposurerelated disclosure requirement. 4 In addition, funds that are subject to rule 18f-4’s limit on
fund leverage risk will have to report the fund’s median daily VaR for the reporting
period, reported as a percentage of the fund’s net asset value. Funds subject to the relative

3

4

See Use of Derivatives by Registered Investment Companies and Business Development
Companies, Investment Company Act Release No. 34084 (Nov. 2, 2020) (“Derivatives Adopting
Release”).
See Derivatives Adopting Release, supra footnote 3, at nn.1036-1037 and accompanying
paragraph.

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VaR test during the reporting period also will report: (1) the name of the fund’s
designated index or a statement that the fund’s designated reference portfolio is its
securities portfolio; (2) the index identifier, as applicable; and (3) the fund’s median VaR
ratio for the reporting period. Finally, all funds that are subject to the limit on fund
leverage risk also will have to report the number of exceptions that the fund identified as
a result of backtesting its VaR calculation model during the reporting period. We estimate
that 2,696 funds will be subject to these VaR-related reporting requirements.4
Table 1 below summarizes our PRA burden estimates associated with filing Form
N-PORT.

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OMB CONTROL NUMBER: 3235-0730

Table 1: Form N-PORT PRA Estimates
Internal initial
burden hours

Internal annual
burden hours

Annual burden for funds that license a software
solution to prepare Form N-PORT

169.33

Number of funds

4,193

Annual burden for funds that retain the services of a
third-party vendor to prepare Form N-PORT

139.33

Number of funds
I. Total annual burden for reporting non-derivatives
related information on Form N-PORT
Report derivatives exposure information for limited
derivative users

$356 [blended
wage rate]

Initial
external
cost
burden

Annual external
cost burden

$60,281

$4,805

x 4,193

x 4,193

$49,601

$11,440

7,787

x 7,787

x 7,787

1,794,963 hours

$639,001,220

$109,230,645
$9125

×

$356 [blended
wage rate]

×

$373 (compliance
attorney)

$1,615

2 hours

4.33 hours

×

$339 (senior
programmer)

$1,467

II. Total annual burden for limited derivatives user
derivatives exposure information

Number of funds

×

4.33 hours2

Number of funds

Total burden for exceedance-related information

Wage rate1

2 hours

Total burden for derivatives exposure information
for limited derivatives users

Report exceedance of 10% derivatives exposure
threshold for limited derivatives users

Internal time
costs

8.66 hours

$3,082

× 2,378

× 2,378

× 2,378

21,593 hours

$7,331,065

$2,168,7366

0 hours

0.01 hours

×

$373 (compliance
attorney)

$3.73

0 hours

0.01 hours

×

$339 (senior
programmer)

$3.39

0.02 hours

$7.12

III. Total annual burden for limited derivatives users
exceedance-related information
Report VaR-related information

× 2,378

× 2,378

47.56 hours

$ 16,931

2 hours

4.33 hours

×

$373 (compliance
attorney)

$1,615

2 hours

4.33 hours

×

$339 (senior
programmer)

$1,467

Total new burden for VaR-related information
Number of funds

8.66 hours

$3,082

× 2,696

× 2,696

$9125

× 2,696

IV. Total annual burden for VaR-related information

23,347 hours

$8,309,072

$2,458,752

Total estimated annual burden (I + II + III + IV)

1,839,903 hours

$654,658,288

$113,858,133

Current burden estimates

1,848,326 hours

$611,247,7377

$108,457,536

Change to current burden estimates

-8,423 hours

-$43,410,551

$5,400,597

Notes to Table 1:
1. Estimates of the relevant wage rates for internal time costs in the table above are based on salary information for the
securities industry compiled by and reported in the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association’s Report on
Management & Professional Earnings in the Securities Industry 2013 (“SIFMA Report”), and modified by Commission staff
to account for an 1,800-hour work-year and multiplied by 5.35 to account for bonuses, firm size, employee benefits,
overhead, and adjusted to account for the effects of inflation. The final internal wage figures are slightly higher than the
proposed estimates due to inflation.
Estimates of the relevant wage rates for external time costs, such as outside legal services, take into account staff
experience, information from a variety of sources including general information websites, and adjustments for inflation.
These PRA estimates assume that the same types of professionals will be involved in the reporting requirements that we
believe otherwise will be involved in preparing and filing reports on Form N-PORT.
2. Includes initial burden estimates annualized over a three-year period.
3. This estimate assumes that, annually after the initial 2 hours to comply with the new N-PORT requirements, a
compliance attorney and a senior programmer will each incur 1 burden hour per filing associated with the new reporting
requirements. The estimate912 of 4.33 hours is based on the following calculation: ((2 hours for the first filing x 1 = 2) +
(3 additional filings in year 1 x 1 hour for each of the additional 3 filings in year 1 = 3) + (4 filings in years 2 and 3 x 1 hour

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per filing x 2 years) = 8) / 3 = 4.33.
4. This estimate is based on the following calculation: $4,210 (average costs for funds reporting the information on Form
N-PORT) * 5,091 funds (which includes funds reporting derivative exposure information and VaR-related information).
5. This estimate is based on the following information and calculations: (35% x $4,805 (the average cost to license a thirdparty software solution per year) = $1,681.75) + (65% x $11,440 (the average cost of retaining the services of a thirdparty vendor to prepare and file reports on Form N-PORT on the fund’s behalf) = $7,436) = basis for existing external NPORT filing costs. We estimate that the new N-PORT requirements will add an additional 10% costs (e.g., ($1,681.75 +
$7,436 = $9,117.75) x 10% = $912 per fund).
6. This estimate of the external annual cost burden of Form N-PORT reporting for limited derivatives users encompasses
any external costs burdens associated with reporting derivatives exposure and any reporting related to exceedances of the
10% derivatives exposure threshold on the Form N-PORT.
7. Current burden estimate of internal time costs is based on the following calculation: $595,631,442 (estimated total
annual internal time cost of Form N-PORT as approved on November 13, 2018) + $15,616,295 (estimated change in
internal time cost for Form N-PORT derivatives-related changes as approved on May 14, 2021).

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OMB CONTROL NUMBER: 3235-0730
13.

Cost to Respondents

Cost burden is the cost of goods and services purchased to prepare and update
filings on Form N-PORT, such as for licensing software solutions or for the services of
external service providers. The cost burden does not include the hour burden discussed
in Item 12. Estimates are based on the Commission’s experience with the filing of
registration forms. As discussed above, we do not estimate any change to the external
costs associated with these amendments to Form N-PORT.
14.

Cost to the Federal Government

The annual cost of reviewing and processing new registration statements,
post-effective amendments, proxy statements, and shareholder reports of investment
companies amounted to approximately $21.9 million in fiscal year 2019, based on the
Commission’s computation of the value of staff time devoted to this activity and related
overhead.
15.

Change in Burden

As summarized in Table 1 above, the estimated hourly burden associated with
Form N-PORT has decreased from 1,848,326 hours to 1,839,903 hours (a decrease of
8,423 hours). The internal time cost has increased from $611,247,737 to $654,658,288
(an increase of $43,410,551). The annual external cost burden has increased from
$108,457,536 to $113,858,133 (an increase of $5,400,597). The changes in burden hours
and cost burdens are due to the effects of inflation and the number of funds that must file
form N-PORT.
16.

Information Collection Planned for Statistical Purposes

Not applicable.

17.

Approval to Omit OMB Expiration Date

We request authorization to omit the expiration date on the electronic version of
the form for design and IT project scheduling reasons. The OMB control number will be
displayed.
18.
Submission

Exceptions to Certification Statement for Paperwork Reduction Act

Not applicable.
B.

COLLECTIONS OF INFORMATION EMPLOYING STATISTICAL METHODS

Not applicable.

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