Summary
American Century Investments Private Client Group, Inc. (American Century Investments) was
organized in 2017 to offer discretionary investment management to individuals, trusts, estates,
charitable organizations, and business entities. In 2020, American Century Investments
began offering the Investment Plan Service (the “Investment Plan Service”). In 2022,
American Century Investments began offering discretionary investment management to
individuals via an online-only service (the “Online Services”). The Investment Plan Service and
the Online Services (collectively, the “Services”) are further described below.
The Investment Plan Service
The Investment Plan Service is a single, point-in-time service of non-discretionary investment
advice. As such, clients can implement part or all the Investment Plan, described below, on
their own with American Century funds directly or through accounts held with brokers, dealers
or advisors not affiliated with American Century Investments. Clients can also build their own
portfolio of mutual funds and/or individual securities with American Century or another
financial firm to match the asset allocation in the Investment Plan.
The Investment Plan Service results in a recommendation that will be a group or asset
allocation of investments and corresponding options to achieve this allocation through either a
single diversified mutual fund or a group of mutual funds, which may be built around other
holdings of the investor (the “Investment Plan”). The investments recommended as part of the
Investment Plan will be mutual funds and exchange-traded funds (“ETFs”) managed by
American Century Investment Management, Inc. (“ACIM”) (collectively, “American Century
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Investments Funds”). ACIM is one of our sister corporations and is also registered with the
SEC as an investment advisor. American Century Investments and ACIM are both wholly
owned subsidiaries of American Century Companies, Inc. (“ACC”). The Investment Plan
Service does not consider or advise on any non-American Century mutual fund or ETF.
The Investment Plan and corresponding agreement expire thirty (30) calendar days after the
client completes the Investment Plan Questionnaire, as defined below, either online or with a
representative. Therefore, the Investment Plan does not account for any subsequent changes
to the client’s financial planning, investment goals, comfort with risk, time horizon, financial
circumstances, the client’s market views or outlook, changes to the client’s retirement plan
services, fees or investment performance. The Investment Plan Service is a non-discretionary
service, so the client must direct us or their financial firm to make the trades necessary to
achieve the asset allocation in the Investment Plan. American Century Investments is not
authorized to implement these recommendations or the Investment Plan without client
consent. In addition, clients are under no obligation to accept the asset allocation advice or
fund recommendations provided by American Century Investments through the Investment
Plan Service.
An American Century Investments representative will review the Investment Plan, including
the underlying fund recommendations, with the client and is available to help with
implementing the Investment Plan.
The Online Services
The Online Services provide recommendations or financial advice about what you should
invest in exclusively through a website or online portal (“Financial Advice”), along with the
following additional services (some with additional fees, as noted):
• Ongoing discretionary investment management
• Access to certain mutual funds and ETFs, including the American Century
Investments mutual funds and ETFs, described below
• Portfolio monitoring and rebalancing
• Financial planning, with additional fees
• Access to personal financial advisors (“American Century Advisors”), with
additional fees
• Unaffiliated qualified custodian
• Brokerage and reporting services
• Data aggregation
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• Detailed performance reporting and goal tracking to help our clients monitor
their progress
Our recommendations to you will only include recommendations regarding asset-allocation
and investments in American Century Investments Funds, and/or American Century
Strategies (defined below) containing only American Century Investments Funds. Whether
you act upon our recommendations is entirely up to you.
American Century Advisors are available during business hours and may be reached via
telephone. The Online Services, including investment management, are available online
anytime. Our advice is based on each client’s financial situation, which is evaluated based on
detailed information about each client’s personal circumstances, including age, investment
time horizon, risk tolerance, and investment restrictions. If the client chooses, additional
financial information about accounts outside of our family of services may be aggregated
through our financial aggregation service.
Ownership
American Century Investments is a wholly-owned subsidiary of American Century Companies,
Inc. (“ACC”). ACC has a multi class capital structure under which certain classes have
different voting rights. Accordingly, as of January 31, 2024 ACC’s owners were as follows:
Shareholder Equity Interest Voting Interest
Stowers Institute for Medical Research* 44% 71%
Nomura Holdings, Inc.** 40% 10%
Current employees and others 16% 19%
*Includes shares held by Stowers Resource Management Inc and Stowers Policy Institute.
** Shares are directly owned by Nomura AM Holdings USA, LLC, an indirect subsidiary of Nomura Holdings, Inc.
Stowers Resource Management Inc. (“SRM”) is a “supporting organization” (as that term is
defined in the Internal Revenue Code), and as such, a public charity. Its primary function as a
legal entity is to support the Stowers Institute for Medical Research (“SIMR”). Jim and Virginia
Stowers founded SIMR in 1994 as a not-for-profit institute dedicated to benefiting
humankind through basic research on genes and proteins that control fundamental processes
in living cells to unlock the mysteries of disease (including cancer) and find the keys to their
causes, treatment, and prevention. It is one of the largest endowments in the world among
private basic biomedical research institutions. Through its ownership interest, SRM is entitled
to over forty percent of all dividends paid by ACC.
All active, eligible employees of ACC and its subsidiaries participate in the ownership of the
firm through the American Century Retirement Plan.
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Since May 19, 2016, Nomura Holdings, Inc. (“Nomura”) has held a minority interest in ACC
and holds two of eleven seats on ACC’s board of directors. From investment management and
general business perspectives, however, ACC and Nomura are legally and operationally
independent and distinct.
Questionnaires
For the Investment Plan Service and the Online Services, clients complete a questionnaire
about the client’s investment goals, investable assets, retirement time horizon, and comfort
with risk (the “Questionnaire”). Clients can complete the Questionnaires online or, for the
Investment Plan Questionnaire only, with an American Century representative. The results of
the Questionnaires are based solely on the information provided by the client. Any
information provided by clients for purposes of obtaining the Services, or changes thereto, will
not be considered for other accounts or services at any American Century entity. Similarly,
any information clients provide to American Century Investments or an affiliate outside of the
Services will not be considered when developing an Investment Plan or Financial Advice for
the client.
Implementation
It is the client’s sole responsibility and decision whether to implement the Investment Plan or
the Financial Advice, including, without limitation, any decision to implement after expiration.
Partial implementation or implementation
after the expiration or a change in the client’s
financial situation or circumstances, may be inconsistent and may result in a different risk
profile. Clients must take action in order to implement the Investment Plan or Financial
Advice.
American Century Investments and its affiliate do not provide any tax advice. Although a
client’s actions to implement an Investment Plan or Financial Advice may raise tax or other
legal implications, clients acknowledge that American Century Investments bears no
responsibility for their decision-making. Clients are responsible for any tax implications
and/or tax obligations arising as a result of the client’s implementation of an Investment Plan
or Financial Advice provided or as a result of the client’s use of the Services. Clients are
strongly encouraged to seek the advice of their accountant or attorney for tax or legal
questions related to their implementation of an Investment Plan, the Financial Advice, or other
use of these Services.
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The Investment Plan Service
American Century Investments does not monitor client portfolios for any reason related to the
Investment Plan Service. American Century Investments and its affiliates have no discretion
with respect to the implementation of any Investment Plan, including a particular savings or
withdrawal strategy. We will not monitor or manage any investments made or accounts
opened by the client, whether with American Century Investments or any of its affiliates or
elsewhere, in order to implement the Investment Plan, nor will we make any trades in or
adjustments to the client’s account unless the client directs us to do so. Implementing an
Investment Plan may result in selling some or all of a client’s existing holdings. It is the client’s
decision to sell existing holdings. American Century Investments and its affiliates will not
advise clients on these transactions.
The Online Services
American Century Investments offers its clients a variety of asset allocation strategies (called
“American Century Strategies”) within the Online Services. American Century Investments
generally manages client accounts within these American Century Strategies, which are
similarly managed “model” portfolios. American Century Investments generally allocates all or
a portion of its clients’ assets into one or more of these American Century Strategies on a
discretionary basis. The American Century Strategies are created and managed by ACIM.
A client’s assets are managed within a given American Century Strategy based upon the
client’s risk profile, which is determined based on a client’s detailed personal and financial
information through the Questionnaires, described above. Clients may change their personal
or financial information at any time, which may result in us recommending a different
American Century Strategy. In general, choosing a shorter time horizon could result in a more
conservative American Century Strategy, and choosing a longer time horizon could result in a
more aggressive American Century Strategy. To receive the Financial Advice and participate
in the Online Services, clients must agree to have their accounts automatically rebalanced
periodically at American Century Investments’ discretion to the appropriate American Century
Strategy.
The firm seeks to ensure that clients’ assets are managed in a manner consistent with their
individual financial situations and investment objectives. Unless utilizing a tax-sensitive model,
if available, securities transactions effected pursuant to a model investment strategy are
usually done without regard to a client’s individual tax ramifications. Therefore, because of
rebalancing, clients may incur adverse tax consequences.
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The American Century Strategies are designed to be comprehensive investment portfolios.
These strategies are designed to help clients meet their financial goals. The American
Century Strategies are globally diversified investment strategies that are selected for each
client. American Century Investments does not engage in general market-timing or the
specific timing of economic cycles, asset or sector classes, or individual securities. American
Century Investments’ primary approach is to use one of the American Century Strategies
aimed at helping clients meet their needs within their risk capacity or tolerance. American
Century Strategies are generally comprised of American Century Investments funds, which
are all subject to varying degrees of investment, market, credit, interest rate, and regulatory
risks.
The American Century Strategies provide risk and return diversification across three broad
asset classes (stocks, bonds and cash) and 24 sub-asset classes. Each American Century
Strategy is managed as a portfolio of funds by ACIM’s Asset Allocation team (the “Investment
Team”), which oversees allocation decisions and fund selection across the diverse sub-asset
class sleeves. The Investment Team employs a disciplined, state-of-the-art portfolio
construction methodology, based on Modern Portfolio Theory and Mean Variance
Optimization. The Investment Team uses these tools together to measure and evaluate the
risk of an investment or group of investments against an expected return. Using these and
other tools, the Investment Team aims to maximize the return within each risk level of the
American Century Strategies.
The Investment Team focuses on strategic, long-term asset allocation, creating an optimal set
of exposures to create specific risk-and-return profiles for Clients. This is because real world
experience and a robust body of academic work indicate that strategic asset allocation is a
key driver of variability in portfolio returns over time. We want the American Century
Strategies to be “all weather” portfolios that will perform reasonably well in the face of multiple
risk factors and across varied market and economic regimes. The Investment Team may,
however, adjust these allocations for tactical or a shorter-term investment perspective in
response to market movements, market expectations, or other factors.
The Investment Team strongly believes that the portfolio construction outcomes it seeks
should be informed by robust estimates of risk, return, and correlation that reflect a complete
market cycle. As a result, the Investment Team’s portfolio construction process begins with
researching the macroeconomic environment and outlook, market and technical signals, and
relative valuations, as well as other fundamental factors. This analysis is both qualitative and
quantitative, relying on input and oversight from ACIM’s Asset Allocation Committee—
comprised of senior investment professionals across ACIM — using a number of advanced
statistical tools and modeling techniques.
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The strategic allocation decision establishes the neutral portfolio weightings across sub-asset
classes. Each sub-asset class sleeve is managed by an ACIM team that specializes in actively
managing securities in that asset class. Each team has its own approach to asset selection,
providing the portfolios with diversification across security selection philosophies and
processes.
All investments involve risk. American Century Investments does not guarantee the results of
the advice given. Significant losses can occur by investing in any security, or by following any
strategy, including those recommended by American Century Investments.
ACIM may offer the American Century Strategies or similar models to unaffiliated advisers or
sponsors. For any model that is available on more than one platform, ACIM maintains a
sequential, sponsor-level trade rotation for those models.
Assets under management
As of March 18, 2024, American Century Investments managed approximately
$1,867,000,000 on a discretionary basis for its clients, which includes assets managed
pursuant to American Century Investments Private Client Group Wrap Fee Program. As of
the same date, American Century Investments managed approximately $174,000 assets on a
non-discretionary basis for its clients.