Portfolio

Reserve Funds has added insult to injury, literally, to the investors in its Primary Fund. The fund, which broke the buck on Sept. 16 and has been struggling to return investors’ assets ever since, is now valuing the remaining balance at 98.5 cents per share.

Alex Widmer, CEO of Swiss bank Julius Baer, died unexpectedly Dec. 3 at the age of 52.

Investors continued to rush to the safety of cash this week, putting an additional $29.06 billion in money market mutual funds, for a total of $3.743 trillion, according to the Investment Company Institute.

Thrivent Financial is continuing its four-year-old partnership with Habitat for Humanity, pledging $24 million this year, which will help build 314 homes.

Seeing traffic on Yahoo’s finance website and Marketwatch.com burgeon, Fidelity Investments has decided to try its hand at financial news for itself, and is revamping its website as a result.

State Street Corp. is laying off 6% of its workforce, or 1,800 people, in the first quarter. Initially, the layoffs will cost the company as much as $350 million, or 51 cents to 55 cents a share, but that will then revert to $400 million in annual savings.

Contrary to widely held beliefs in the annuity and insurance industries that they are poised to cash in on the 78 million retiring Baby Boomers, a new report from Diversified Services Group finds that mutual funds are positioning themselves to do a better job of serving this market.

Neuberger Berman managers have bid for and won the right to buy the asset management business in a court-supervised sale, a source confirmed with Investment Dealers’ Digest.

Confidence among affluent and millionaire investors sunk further in November, according to Spectrem Group.The Spectrem Millionaire Investor Index fell 15 points in November, to an all-time low of 39.

The outlook for exchange-traded products (both funds and notes) is strong, according to a new report from SEI called “Exchange-Traded Products: A Look Ahead.” Over the past 10 years, assets in such products have grown from $16 billion to $487 billion, for an annual compound growth rate of 41%.