Alternative investments

BlackRock reported second quarter earnings of $218 million, a 20% decrease from the $274 million it earned a year ago. Revenue also fell, by 26%, to $1.03 billion.

Fixed annuity sales jumped 74% to a record $35.6 billion in the first quarter, according to LIMRA.

Genworth Life and Annuity Insurance has launched RetireReady One, a streamlined variable annuity aimed at helping advisers more easily personalize a guaranteed income strategy for clients.

Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth William F. Galvin is investigating the sales materials of fund companies that sell leveraged exchange-traded funds.

Working with elderly clients can be challenging, but by networking with the right contacts and involving clients' heirs, some advisers are developing a lucrative and self-feeding business-and fund companies that can provide them with retirement income products that rely on capital preservation rather than aggressive investments will come out the winners.

Of course, it cannot be proved that hedge funds contributed to the financial crisis, as the Department of the Treasury said last week. However, it's more than likely that the top-performing hedge fund managers, those earning a staggering $1 billion a year in 2006, 2007 and 2008, were invested in the mortgage-backed and leveraged instruments that brought the economy to its knees.

NEW YORK -- An investors' advocacy group is challenging the Obama Administration and Congress to do more for the needs of average investors.

Brokers who offer advice to investors may be held to the same fiduciary standards as investment advisers if legislation proposed by the Obama Administration is passed by Congress.

The mutual fund industry will be a shadow of its former self in just five years time, if the findings of a new study by Novarica pan out.

Massachusetts Secretary of State William F. Galvin is investigating the sales materials of fund companies that sell leveraged exchange-traded funds, The Boston Globe reports.

New enhancements to Envestnet’s unified managed account (UMA), such as product expansion, systematic income withdrawals and adviser-created asset allocations, will allow advisers to customize client accounts ranging from $150,000 to multi-millions on a single platform.

Tocqueville Asset Management will acquire Delafield Asset Management, a provider of mutual funds, separately managed accounts and limited partnerships. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

It could take as long as five years for asset managers around the world to recoup the $10 trillion they lost in 2008, according to a report by Cerulli, which calls the global meltdown "of near-biblical proportions."

Fidelity Investments aims to double its assets under administration in the next five years, and stepped-up sales through banks will be a major contributor, company executives said.

Nearly every asset class saw robust performance in the second quarter, but the initial elation at the lack of terrible news has worn off as investors brace for a tough second half, according to Lipper's review of the second quarter.

While mergers and acquisitions among asset management companies were down significantly during the first half of 2009, many M&A experts predict this decline will flatten out or reverse by the end of the year, driven by renewed faith in the profitability of asset firms and banks' continued need to raise capital.

Alternative investment manager Hattaras Funds has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire a controlling interest in Alternative Investment Partners, which offers a line of open-end hedge funds-of-funds called AIP Mutual Funds.

The Treasury Department tapped nine fund managers, including five mutual fund companies as well as private equity and hedge funds, to help implement its Public-Private Investment Program, established to address legacy real estate assets.

It could take as long as five years for asset managers around the world to recoup the $10 trillion they lost in 2008, according to a report by Cerulli, which calls the global meltdown “of near-biblical proportions.”

As the economic slump curbs retirement savings and the government considers imposing curbs on target-date funds, Great-West Retirement Services is trying out what its president is calling "the next generation" of target-date funds.