Fidelity’s Closing Mutual Fund Prices Not Published

Fidelity Investments scrambled to answer questions from investors about why closing mutual fund prices weren’t published in Wednesday’s newspapers.

Boston-based Fidelity said the reason the prices didn’t appear in papers, including The Times, was because of a “miscommunication” with the Nasdaq Stock Market. The Nasdaq system is the organization that disseminates closing net asset values for funds to newspapers and other media outlets.

“We thought we had until 6:25 p.m. Eastern time to get the prices to Nasdaq after we thought we got such a commitment from the Nasdaq,” said David Jones, a Fidelity vice president involved in setting pricing policies for the company’s funds.

Fidelity began transmitting the fund closing prices to Nasdaq at about 6:15 p.m., Jones said.

“Apparently, the Nasdaq was unable to accept those prices,” Jones said. “It was an unpleasant and regrettable surprise, since getting the prices in the newspapers is a very important service for our shareholders.”

Other fund groups, including Boston’s Eaton Vance Corp., reported similar problems.

A Nasdaq spokesman said its deadline for receiving fund closing prices is usually 5:40 p.m. Eastern time. Nasdaq extended the deadline Tuesday because of the record amount of trading, which resulted in some technical problems.

Nasdaq volume reached more than 1.3 billion shares, a pace that overloaded the market’s system of trade reporting.

Due to the high volume, the closing fund prices started being disseminated to media outlets at 6:11 p.m., the Nasdaq spokesman said.

Fidelity also faces questions for reporting that its Hong Kong & China Fund rose 0.2% in value Tuesday, while Hong Kong’s benchmark Hang Seng stock index plunged 13.7%, the biggest drop since the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown in Beijing.

The Hang Seng recovered Wednesday, rising 1,705.4 points, or 18.82%, after the U.S. stock market rallied.

To calculate the price for the Hong Kong fund, “we used every kind of market information we could get on trading after the Hong Kong market closed,” Jones said. “It was clear that Hong Kong stocks were up significantly by 4 p.m. Eastern time in the U.S., and that was confirmed when the Hang Seng index opened up 14%.”

Fidelity’s report that its Hong Kong fund rose 0.2% contrasts with a report that other Hong Kong funds, including the U.S. Global Investors China Region Opportunity Fund and Guinness Flight China & Hong Kong Fund, were down about 10%.