58086 Federal Register / Vol. 67, No. 178 / Friday, September 13, 2002 / Notices 

G. 4:30–6 p.m.: Stakeholder 

Interactions (Open)—The Committee 

will reserve this time for interactions 

with stakeholders and meeting 

participants. 

Thursday, September 26, 2002 

H. 8:30–8:35 a.m.: Opening Statement

(Open)—The ACNW Chairman will 

make opening remarks regarding the 

conduct of the meeting. 

I. 8:35–4 p.m.: U.S. Department of 

Energy (DOE) Scientific Update for 

Selected Activities of the Geologic 

Repository Program at Yucca Mountain

(Open)—The Committee will hear 

updates from DOE representatives on 

the following topics: 

• DOE Opening Remarks 

• Rebaselining of DOE Yucca 

Mountain Program 

• Final Environmental Impact 

Statement for Yucca Mountain 

• Repository Design Update 

• Proposed Resolution of Anomalous 

Chlorine-36 Indications. 

• Microbial-Induced Corrosion 

Considerations 

J. 4:15–5:15 p.m.: Stakeholder 

Interactions (Open)—The Committee 

will reserve this time for interactions 

with stakeholders and meeting 

participants. 

K. 5:15–6:45 p.m.: Preparation of 

ACNW Reports (Open)—The Committee 

will discuss proposed reports on the 

following topics: 

• Orphan Sources 

• KTI Status Report 

• Integrated IRSR 

• Public Outreach 

• DOE Scientific Update (tentative) 

L. 6:45–7 p.m.: Miscellaneous

(Open)—The Committee will discuss 

matters related to the conduct of 

Committee activities and matters and 

specific issues that were not completed 

during previous meetings, as time and 

availability of information permit. 

Procedures for the conduct of and 

participation in ACNW meetings were 

published in the Federal Register on 

October 3, 2001 (66 FR 50461). In 

accordance with these procedures, oral 

or written statements may be presented 

by members of the public; electronic 

recordings will be permitted only 

during those portions of the meeting 

that are open to the public; and 

questions may be asked by members of 

the Committee, its consultants, staff, 

and the public. Persons desiring to make 

oral statements should notify Mr. 

Howard J. Larson, ACNW (Telephone 

301/415–6805), between 8 a.m. and 4 

p.m. EDT, as far in advance as 

practicable so that appropriate 

arrangements can be made to schedule 

the necessary time during the meeting 

for such statements. Use of still, motion 

picture, and television cameras during 

this meeting will be limited to selected 

portions of the meeting as determined 

by the ACNW Chairman. Information 

regarding the time to be set aside for 

taking pictures may be obtained by 

contacting the ACNW office, prior to the 

meeting. In view of the possibility that 

the schedule for ACNW meetings may 

be adjusted by the Chairman as 

necessary to facilitate the conduct of the 

meeting, persons planning to attend 

should notify Mr. Howard J. Larson as 

to their particular needs. 

Further information regarding topics 

to be discussed, whether the meeting 

has been canceled or rescheduled, the 

Chairman’s ruling on requests for the 

opportunity to present oral statements 

and the time allotted therefor can be 

obtained by contacting Mr. Howard J. 

Larson. 

ACNW meeting notices, meeting 

transcripts, and letter reports are now 

available for downloading or viewing on 

the Internet at http://www.nrc.gov/

ACRSACNW.

Videoteleconferencing service is 

available for observing open sessions of 

ACNW meetings. Those wishing to use 

this service for observing ACNW 

meetings should contact Mr. Theron 

Brown, ACNW Audiovisual Technician 

(301/415–8066), between 7:30 a.m. and 

3:45 p.m. EDT, at least 10 days before 

the meeting to ensure the availability of 

this service. Individuals or 

organizations requesting this service 

will be responsible for telephone line 

charges and for providing the 

equipment and facilities that they use to 

establish the videoteleconferencing link. 

The availability of 

videoteleconferencing services is not 

guaranteed.

Dated: September 9, 2002. 

Andrew L. Bates, 

Advisory Committee Management Officer.

[FR Doc. 02–23362 Filed 9–12–02; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 7590–01–P

PENSION BENEFIT GUARANTY 

CORPORATION 

Required Interest Rate Assumption for 

Determining Variable-Rate Premium; 

Interest Assumptions for 

Multiemployer Plan Valuations 

Following Mass Withdrawal

AGENCY: Pension Benefit Guaranty 

Corporation.

ACTION: Notice of interest rates and 

assumptions. 

SUMMARY: This notice informs the public 

of the interest rates and assumptions to 

be used under certain Pension Benefit 

Guaranty Corporation regulations. These 

rates and assumptions are published 

elsewhere (or can be derived from rates 

published elsewhere), but are collected 

and published in this notice for the 

convenience of the public. Interest rates 

are also published on the PBGC’s Web 

site (http://www.pbgc.gov).

DATES: The required interest rate for 

determining the variable-rate premium 

under part 4006 applies to premium 

payment years beginning in September 

2002. The interest assumptions for 

performing multiemployer plan 

valuations following mass withdrawal 

under part 4281 apply to valuation dates 

occurring in October 2002.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

Harold J. Ashner, Assistant General 

Counsel, Office of the General Counsel, 

Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, 

1200 K Street, NW., Washington, DC 

20005, 202–326–4024. (TTY/TDD users 

may call the Federal relay service tollfree at 1–800–877–8339 and ask to be 

connected to 202–326–4024.)

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

Variable-Rate Premiums 

Section 4006(a)(3)(E)(iii)(II) of the 

Employee Retirement Income Security 

Act of 1974 (ERISA) and section 

4006.4(b)(1) of the PBGC’s regulation on 

Premium Rates (29 CFR part 4006) 

prescribe use of an assumed interest rate 

(the ‘‘required interest rate’’) in 

determining a single-employer plan’s 

variable-rate premium. The required 

interest rate is the ‘‘applicable 

percentage’’ (currently 100 percent) of 

the annual yield on 30-year Treasury 

securities for the month preceding the 

beginning of the plan year for which 

premiums are being paid (the ‘‘premium 

payment year’’). (Although the Treasury 

Department has ceased issuing 30-year 

securities, the Internal Revenue Service 

announces a surrogate yield figure each 

month—based on the 30-year Treasury 

bond maturing in February 2031—

which the PBGC uses to determine the 

required interest rate.) 

The required interest rate to be used 

in determining variable-rate premiums 

for premium payment years beginning 

in September 2002 is 5.08 percent. 

The following table lists the required 

interest rates to be used in determining 

variable-rate premiums for premium 

payment years beginning between 

October 2001 and September 2002.

For premium payment years 

beginning in—

The required 

interest rate 

is—

October 2001 ........................ 4.66 

November 2001 .................... 4.52 

Federal Register / Vol. 67, No. 178 / Friday, September 13, 2002 / Notices 58087

1See generally James M. Storey and Thomas M 

Clyde, Mutual Fund Law Handbook 7.2 (1998).

2 Division of Investment Management, SEC, 

Protecting Investors: A Half Century of Investment 

Company Regulation 251 (1992).

3See SEC, Report on the Public Policy 

Implications of Investment Company Growth, H.R. 

Rep. No. 2337, 89th Cong., 2d. Sess. 12, 127, 148 

(1966) (stating that funds generally are formed by 

their advisers and remain under their control, and 

that advisers’ influence permeates fund activities).

4See Storey and Clyde, supra note .

5For instance, Fund directors must approve 

investment advisory and distribution contracts [15 

U.S.C. 80a–15(a), (b), and (c)].

6Role of Independent Directors of Investment 

Companies, Investment Company Act Release No. 

24816 (Jan. 2, 2001) [66 FR 3735 (Jan. 16, 2001)] 

(‘‘Adopting Release’’).

7A ‘‘control person’’ is any person—other than a 

fund—directly or indirectly controlling controlled 

by, or under common control, with any of the 

fund’s management organizations. See 17 CFR 

270.01(a)(6)(iv)(B).

For premium payment years 

beginning in—

The required 

interest rate 

is—

December 2001 .................... 4.35 

January 2002 ........................ 5.48 

February 2002 ...................... 5.45 

March 2002 ........................... 5.40 

April 2002 ............................. 5.71 

May 2002 .............................. 5.68 

June 2002 ............................. 5.65 

July 2002 .............................. 5.52 

August 2002 ......................... 5.39 

September 2002 ................... 5.08 

Multiemployer Plan Valuations 

Following Mass Withdrawal 

The PBGC’s regulation on Duties of 

Plan Sponsor Following Mass 

Withdrawal (29 CFR part 4281) 

prescribes the use of interest 

assumptions under the PBGC’s 

regulation on Allocation of Assets in 

Single-Employer Plans (29 CFR part 

4044). The interest assumptions 

applicable to valuation dates in October 

2002 under part 4044 are contained in 

an amendment to part 4044 published 

elsewhere in today’s Federal Register. 

Tables showing the assumptions 

applicable to prior periods are codified 

in appendix B to 29 CFR part 4044.

Issued in Washington, DC, on this 6th day 

of September, 2002. 

Joseph H. Grant, 

Deputy Executive Director and Chief 

Operating Officer, Pension Benefit Guaranty 

Corporation.

[FR Doc. 02–23345 Filed 9–12–02; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 7708–01–P

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE 

COMMISSION 

Existing Collection; Comment Request

Upon Written Request, Copies Available 

From: Securities and Exchange 

Commission, Office of Filings and 

Information Services, Washington, DC 

20549.

Extension: Rule 0–1 [17 CFR 270.0–1], SEC 

File No. 270–472, OMB Control No. 

3235–0531

Notice is hereby given that, pursuant 

to the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 

(44 U.S.C. 350l–3520), the Securities 

and Exchange Commission (the 

‘‘Commission’’) is soliciting comments 

on the collection of information 

summarized below. The Commission 

plans to submit this existing collection 

of information to the Office of 

Management and Budget (‘‘OMB’’) for 

extension and approval. 

Investment companies (‘‘funds’’) are 

formed as corporations or business 

trusts under State law and, like other 

corporations and trusts, must be 

operated for the benefit of their 

shareholders.1 Funds are unique, 

however, in that they are ‘‘organized 

and operated by people whose primary 

loyalty and pecuniary interest lie 

outside the enterprise.’’ 2 As described 

below, this ‘‘external management’’ of 

most funds presents inherent conflicts 

of interest and potential for abuses.

An investment adviser typically 

organizes a fund and is responsible for 

its day-to-day operations. The adviser 

provides the seed money, officers, 

employees, and office space, and 

usually selects the initial board of 

directors. In many cases, the investment 

adviser sponsors several funds that 

share administrative and distribution 

systems as part of a ‘‘family of funds.’’

As a result of this extensive 

involvement, and the general absence of 

shareholder activism, many investment 

advisers typically dominate the funds 

they advise.3

Investment advisers to funds are 

themselves generally organized as 

corporations, which have their own 

shareholders. These shareholders have 

an interest in the fund that is quite 

different from the interests of the fund’s 

shareholders. For example, while fund 

shareholders ordinarily prefer lower 

fees (to achieve greater returns), 

shareholders of the fund’s investment 

adviser might want to maximize profits 

through higher fees. And while fund 

shareholders might prefer that advisers 

use brokers that charge the lowest 

possible commissions, advisers might 

prefer brokers that will provide 

investment research in exchange for 

commissions. These types of conflicts 

(and others) resulted in the pervasive 

abuses in the fund industry that led 

Congress in 1940 to enact legislation 

regulating the activities of mutual 

funds.4

The Investment Company Act of 1940 

(‘‘Investment Company Act’’ or ‘‘Act’’) 

establishes a comprehensive regulatory 

scheme designed to protect fund 

investors by addressing the conflicts of 

interest between funds and their 

investment advisers and other affiliated 

persons. The Investment Company Act 

places significant responsibility on the 

board of directors in overseeing the 

operations of the fund and policing 

conflicts of interest.5

Independent fund directors represent 

the interests of shareholders, acting as 

watchdogs for investors and providing a 

check on management. On January 2, 

2001, the Commission adopted 

amendments to ten exemptive rules 

under the Act that were designed to 

enhance the effectiveness of boards of 

directors of funds and to better enable 

investors to assess the independences of 

those directors.6 In the Adopting 

Release, the Commission amended rule 

0–1 to add a definition of ‘‘independent 

legal counsel.’’ The Adopting Release 

amended the exemptive rules to require 

that any person who acts as legal 

counsel to the independent directors of 

any fund relying on the rules must be 

an ‘‘independent legal counsel.’’ This 

requirement was added because 

independent directors can better 

perform the responsibilities assigned to 

them under the Act and the rules if they 

have the assistance of a truly 

independent legal counsel.

Rule 0–1 provides that a person is an 

independent legal counsel if a fund’s 

independent directors determine (and 

record the basis for that determination 

in the minutes of their meeting) that any 

representation of the fund’s investment 

adviser, principal underwriter, 

administrator (collectively, 

‘‘management organizations’’) or their 

‘‘control persons’’ 7 during the past two 

years is or was sufficiently limited that 

that it is unlikely to adversely affect the 

professional judgment of the person in 

providing legal representation. In 

addition, the independent directors 

must have obtained an undertaking from 

the counsel to provide them with 

information necessary to make their 

determination and to update promptly 

that information when the person begins 

to represent, or materially increases his 

representation of, a management 

organization or control person. 

Generally, the independent directors 

must re-evaluate their determination at 

least annually.

Any fund that relies on an exemptive 

rule in the Adopting Release is required 

to use the definition of independent 

legal counsel contained in rule 0–1. We 

assume that approximately 4,050 funds