Investment advisers are subject to numerous rules and regulations regarding their books and records. A recent ACA Compliance Group (ACA) program, featuring Beth Manzi, chief operating officer of private fund administrator PEF Services LLC, and Theodore E. Eichenlaub, partner at ACA, offered a comprehensive overview of the documents and records that investment advisers are required to maintain. The program also focused on methods for ensuring that those documents and records be complete, accessible and in a proper form in the event of an SEC examination. This article, the first in a two-part series, discusses the regulatory background surrounding the maintenance of adviser-specific records, including corporate and accounting documents; marketing documents; and emails. The second article will consider the electronic storage of records, document destruction, testing of compliance programs and SEC examinations. For additional commentary from ACA, see “How Private Fund Managers Can Avoid Common Pitfalls When Calculating and Advertising Internal Rates of Return” (Sep. 7, 2017); and “Compliance Corner Q4-2017: Regulatory Filings and Other Considerations That Hedge Fund Managers Should Note in the Coming Quarter” (Oct. 12, 2017).