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The decision came after months of study by a presidential working group of top officials and regulators. They looked at both the hedge fund industry, which has more than $1 trillion in assets, and the management of private equity firms, which take direct control and ownership of companies rather than relying on large numbers of outside stockholders.

The group’s conclusions reflected both the strong antiregulatory ideology of the administration and the formidable influence of Wall Street and the increasingly wealthy hedge fund industry among both Democrats and Republicans in Washington.

Three of the administration’s most senior economic policy makers — Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr., his top deputy, Robert K. Steel, and White House chief of staff Joshua Bolten — are alumni of Goldman Sachs, which in the last decade has evolved into one of the most important players in the private equity market.

As hedge funds have grown both in the United States and globally, and as periodic collapses have shaken the markets and caused investors to lose money, pressures have increased to impose greater regulation on them. But supporters say that the hedge fund industry had grown more sophisticated in recent years, is well equipped to manage risks, and that none of the failures have harmed the nation’s financial system.

The explosive growth in recent years of private equity investment and hedge funds has made their managers symbols of new wealth, a huge source of philanthropy to the nation’s museums, hospitals and orchestras, and a major new force in political campaigns.

Millions of Americans do not qualify to make investments in hedge funds, which are pools of largely unregulated assets, but they are exposed to the risks associated with hedge funds through their pensions and personal retirement accounts.

The decision to avoid demanding more openness from private funds represents a starkly different approach to that undertaken by Washington for publicly traded companies, which in the last five years have faced a battery of new governance, auditing and disclosure rules following the scandals at Enron and other large companies.

The working group rejected any proposal that would give the government the ability to inspect the books and records of hedge funds or force the funds to make regular reports about their activities. Both banks and brokerage firms must adhere to stringent rules that give regulators great leeway in supervising them.

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