A news report said each entry also includes a performance, risk, and cost analysis and then ranks more than 20,000 mutual funds on a 1 to 5 (highest) scale. The new data is available on the S&P’s MarketScope Advisor platform.

S&P said it brings to the analysis tools such S&P STARS research, S&P Credit Ratings, S&P Fair Value, and S&P Quality Ranks.

S&P ranks mutual funds by decile within their S&P Asset Category and provides detailed peer comparisons throughout the fund reports. A fund’s ranking and pricing data are refreshed every week, reflecting its performance for the period as well as changes to S&P’s assessment of individual components as of the close of trading on the prior Friday, the news release said.

“We believe that past performance should be the beginning of the search for a mutual fund – and not the end,” said Todd Rosenbluth, Director at Standard & Poor’s Equity Research Services. “By conducting proprietary holdings-based analysis and factoring in various performance, risk and cost components, the Standard & Poor’s Mutual Fund Rankings provides insight into how a fund is positioned, rather than solely looking at the past.”