Dave Lindorff

National Planning Holdings, Inc., one of the nation’s larger independent broker-dealer networks, announced this week it has contracted with business technology firm Erado to supply its more than 3,500 affiliated representatives with compliance services for social media applications.

In what may be a sign of a tightening of regulation of social media use by investment advisors, the Securities Division of the Massachusetts Secretary of State’s Office is issuing new guidelines and best practices standards that will go into effect next year.

Securities America, the nation's seventh-largest independent broker-dealer according to Financial Planning's 2011 revenue rankings, continues to lose reps at rapid clip as they and the rest of the industry await the unit's eventual sale.

As the deadline for raising the U.S. debt ceiling nears, anxious investors are wondering whether they should be worried about a market crash and, if so, how they can protect their portfolios. IndexIQ thinks it has an answer -- one that gives investors downside protection, but also allows them to benefit if things go the other way and Washington strikes a deal by the Aug. 2 deadline.

There are two gigantic economic crises weighing heavily on the minds of investors and government leaders right now: the raising of the debt ceiling and the risk to the country’s venerable AAA sovereign debt rating. But one UBS strategist believes all this anxiety and posturing will likely amount to much ado about nothing.

For many employees faced with the prospect of having to save for rising healthcare costs and for retirement, it's important to understand that it doesn't necessarily have to be an either/or decision.

Faithshares is getting out of the Christian values exchange-traded fund business, confirming this week it will shutter its last remaining religious values-based ETF, the Christian Values Fund ETF (FOC), sometime next month.

The earthquake, tsunami and ensuing damage to nuclear power plants that rocked Japan in early March were blamed for a good chunk of the slowdown that hit the U.S. economy this spring. But now Moody’s Analytics is reporting that half of the loss of output in Japanese economic and industrial activity resulting from the disaster has rebounded, and the outlook for 2012 is for 3.2% growth.

It turns out, talk of Bank of America's proposed settlement with a group of institutional investors that suffered steep financial losses investing in mortgage-backed security issued by mortgage loan provider Countrywide Financial Corp. may be a bit premature.

Even if the politicians in Washington do manage to raise the debt ceiling, all the red ink and all the money printed by the Federal Reserve to prop up the economy over the past three years make it likely, according to some experts, that inflation could be on the rise and that reality has many investors understandably unnerved.

There is a lot of concern among investors about the looming Aug. 2 debt ceiling crisis, but Fred Dickson, chief investment strategist at D.A. Davidson, said everyone just needs to relax.

The rating agency Moody’s this week announced that it is placing five of the 15 states with triple-A ratings on review for possible downgrade because of the growing possibility of a downgrade in the U.S. sovereign AAA rating.

When financial advisors are working with clients to figure out their retirement strategy, they need to factor in inflation into the mix. But the question is, how does one decide what inflation is likely to be years into the future when there are so many different ways to measure it even in the present?

Bond investors have been put on notice by rating agency Standard & Poor's that it is not just the U.S. sovereign debt rating that is in jeopardy because of the ongoing wrangling in Washington over raising -- or not raising -- the federal debt ceiling and, especially, whether or how lawmakers cut the government’s massive and ever-growing deficit.

So far so good. That’s the word from the Council of Institutional Investors, a non-profit association of pension funds, retirement funds, endowments and foundations, regarding the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act passed by Congress and signed into law a year ago this week.

Putting aside the debt ceiling drama currently playing out in Washington and the dire predictions of what would happen to the U.S. and the global economy if the ceiling isn’t raised by Aug. 2, Goldman Sachs’ chief U.S. economist said that even if all that doesn’t come to pass, the U.S. economy will still slow this year and next and puts the chances of a return to recession somewhere between 15% and 20%.

Morgan Stanley Smith Barney is laying off financial advisors, but the big bank denies that it has any major layoff planned, as was reported earlier this week by Fox Business News.

Now that Standard & Poor's has issued a negative credit watch on U.S. government debt and acknowledged the possibility that no deal will be reached to raise the government’s debt ceiling, what should investors do?

For years, PIMCO’s taxable bond Total Return Fund (PTTRX) has been a top-performer in its class, with five-star ratings from both Morningstar and S&P, five-year annualized trailing returns of 8.9%, and a manager, William Gross, widely respected as among one of the top in industry.

Moody’s and S&P are warning they may soon downgrade the United States’ coveted AAA sovereign debt rating if the debt ceiling isn’t raised or if the country misses any debt payments or fails to meet obligations like distributing Social Security checks, but at least one credit rating firm appears to have reached the end of its patience.