Stupid CFAI Ethics Question

I don’t see any violation here but CFAI does: (Page 121, book 1 CFAI) “Ottie Zardt, CFA, has worked as a real estate analyst for Apfelbaum for the past 18 months. A new independent rating service has determined that Zardt’s recommendations have resulted in an excess return of 12%, versus the industry’s return on 2.7% for the past twelve months. After learning about the rating service, Zardt immediately updates the promotional material he is preparing for distribution at an upcoming industry conference. He includes a reference to the rating service and quotes its returns results and other information. Before distributing the material at the conference, he adds a footnote adding ‘Past performance is no guarantee of future results.’” Question: “When distributing materials at the conference, does Zardt violate CFA rules?” Why is this a violation? He disclosed that it’s Zardt’s finding that he indeed returned 12% last year, and he did not guarantee future performance. The paragarph mentions that he quotes his return results and other info. It doesn’t indicate he is misleading anyone, I don’t think. He should already know how much his portfolio returns were for the last 12 months so he has that researched. The answer says he “did not verify the accuracy of the return info before its distribution…analysts must make reasonable efforts to ensure that the info is fair, accurate and complete.” I’m going to jump up my a$$ and die now.

I am not and unfortunately may never get a chance to be an analyst… But if I was, I would be able to tell you what my return was for the past yr, 18 months, 5 yrs, etc off the top of my head… Move on rellison… CFAI ain’t worth it

Maybe it’s because he is a real estate analyst and not a PM - i.e the investment results weren’t ‘real’ in the sense of being actual returns. I imagine if he had been the Pm of the Apfelbaum Long/Short Global Equity Fund and those were the fund’s results than he would not have fallen afoul of the Ethics mumbojumbo

“immediately” might be where the problem is.

Yeah, he made no effort to understand where Zardt rating service came up with their return figures. He just accepted it as fact. You have to know how it is calculated and if it is accurate.