Russell Commission Recapture Saves Clients $1 Billion (Russell.com)

Russell Sets Schedule for 2006 Index Reconstitution
Unique Process Keeps Stock Benchmarks True to Market Realities

Tacoma, Wash. — April 11, 2006 — Russell Investment Group has set its schedule for the annual reconstitution of Russell stock indexes, benchmarks for more than $3.8 trillion in funds. Lists of probable additions and deletions will be posted Friday, June 16 on www.russell.com. Final index membership will take effect June 30 and remain in place for the ensuing 12-month period.

Membership in Russell's indexes is determined by objective rules, such as market capitalization rankings. Accurate benchmarks are an integral part of Russell's ongoing process to monitor more than 6,600 investment manager products worldwide for Russell's $167 billion active investment management business.

"Reconstitution is a key feature of truly representative benchmarks," said Lori Richards, director of client service for Russell indexes. "Russell's unique process completely recalibrates Russell's U.S. indexes to today's market realities, ensuring that stocks are moved into the right 'buckets' to truly represent small-cap, midcap, large-cap and microcap stocks. It also serves measure of the shifts in relative valuations of value and growth stocks over the past year."

Russell index reconstitution schedule

WHEN	INFORMATION AVAILABLE
June 16 (after markets close)	Preliminary lists of companies being added to or deleted from the total market Russell 3000E™ Index (based on market capitalization as of May 31) are posted on www.russell.com.
June 23 and June 30	Russell posts updates to the preliminary lists, taking into account data adjustments on companies and their capitalizations.
June 30	Newly reconstituted indexes take effect at the close of U.S. equity markets.
July 3	Newly rebalanced membership lists for the Russell 3000 as well as the Russell 1000® Index, Russell 2000® Index and Russell Microcap™ Index will be posted in alphabetical order on www.russell.com.

The annual reconstitution of Russell indexes captures the 4,000 largest U.S. stocks at the end of May, ranking them by market capitalization to create the broad-market Russell 3000E. The largest 1,000 companies in the ranking comprise the large-cap Russell 1000, while the following 2,000 companies comprise the small-cap Russell 2000. Preliminary membership lists are announced June 16 and they take effect after the markets close on the last Friday of the month. The final, official membership lists for the Russell 3000E, Russell 1000, Russell Midcap® Index, Russell 2000 and Russell Microcap are available publicly by July 3 at www.russell.com.

Beginning this year, companies deleted from the preliminary lists in June due to corporate actions or delisting will not be replaced prior to reconstitution. This change, which was based on recommendations from Russell's Client Advisory Board, will reduce possible trading risks related to uncontrollable corporate activity during June. Similarly, two years ago Russell moved reconstitution's effective date each year to the last Friday in June, instead of the last day in June. This change gives the industry additional time over the weekend to manage any increase in stock trading volumes that occurs as funds and managers adjust for the new membership of the respective indexes.

While Russell's indexes cannot be invested in directly, a record $3.8 trillion in assets is benchmarked to them. This milestone accounts for actively and passively managed institutional and retail funds. Another measure, exchange-traded funds based on Russell indexes, shows similar growth. They now total $38 billion, increasing from $27 billion a year ago.

About Russell
Russell Investment Group, a global leader in multi-manager investment services, provides investment products and services in 44 countries. Russell manages more than $167 billion in assets and advises clients worldwide representing more than $2.4 trillion. Founded in 1936, Russell is a subsidiary of Northwestern Mutual and is headquartered in Tacoma, Wash., with additional offices in New York, Toronto, London, Paris, Singapore, Sydney, Auckland and Tokyo.

Contacts:
Steve Claiborne, 253-439-1858

Russell Investment Group is a registered trade name of Frank Russell Company, a Washington, USA corporation, which operates through subsidiaries worldwide. Frank Russell Company is a subsidiary of The Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company.

RC#4392