Alternative investments

Regulators have agreed to delay plans to treat equity-indexed annuities like securities, but many bank-affiliated brokerages are already doing so.

State Street Global Advisors launched a short-term corporate bond exchange-traded fund.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., dropped efforts to temporarily extend the estate tax at its current level in the face of Republican opposition.

Investors faced whopping losses as a result of the economic recession and the deep scars left by the financial insecurity of the past 18 months had most individuals investing in relatively safe bonds in 2009.

Putnam Investments announced Wednesday that its suite of target Absolute Return Funds has surpassed $1 billion in assets, less than a year after they were launched.

Many target-date retirement funds are still heavily invested in risky, high-yield junk bonds in order to give investors the yields they promise, Bloomberg reports.

WASHINGTON — Sens. Maria Cantwell, D-Wa., and John McCain, R-Ariz., introduced a bill Wednesday that would repeal the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999 by restoring the walls between the banking, securities and insurance industries.

The SPARK Institute has released draft guidelines that help 403(b) retirement plans comply with new regulations, including Form 5500.

Money manager Neuberger Berman has agreed to pay $200 million for a diversified portfolio of 21 private equity investments from a European office.

Mutual funds and exchange-traded funds increased asset flows in November, according to a report by Morningstar Inc.

A pension fund has sued Goldman Sachs Group Inc. for its use of bonuses to employees during the first nine months of the year. The lawsuit was filed in state court in New York.

Affiliated Managers Group, a Boston asset manager, announced Monday that it has agreed to acquire Highbury Financial, an investment management holding company based in New York.

TD Waterhouse has become the first execution only brokerage firm in the U.K. to offer its investors holding their shares in nominee form the right to receive proxy materials and vote electronically.

John Hancock Funds announced Monday it has completed the adoption of Fiduciary Management Associates' FMA Small Company Portfolio, and has launched it as the new John Hancock Small Company Fund.

BlackRock Inc. announced in a regulatory filing that it plans to introduce a portfolio to give high-net-worth investors access to difficult-to-obtain hedge funds.

Symetra Life Insurance Company has launched a group variable annuity for the 403(b) and 457 marketplaces, with schools and nonprofits in mind.

Despite heavy losses in their portfolios, most high-net-worth investors are sticking with their financial advisers, according to the Northstar/Sullivan Rebuilding Investor Trust Survey.

Fund managers are betting that emerging markets will be the best place for growth in 2010, due to their lack of correlation to the rest of the world and its sluggish, forecasted recovery, but lower correlation does not mean greater safety.

American Century Investments is a brand-new player in the international wealth management business-and that novelty could be an ace up its sleeve, according to the company's top executive.

Charles Schwab Investment Management announced Friday that trading has begun in two new exchange-traded funds, with no online trading commissions for Schwab clients and low operating expense ratios.