Portfolio

The Bush administration pledged last week to improve fee disclosure in 401(k)s. The Department of Labor's Employee Benefits Security Administration is now accepting ideas on how to do so from the public and the investment management industry. The deadline for comments is July 24.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.-Target-date funds will continue to increase in popularity due to their simplicity, automatic rebalancing and diversification, according to panelists at Financial Research Associates' "Target Date Lifecycle Funds" conference here last week.

In their zeal to cash in on the latest investment craze, fund companies all too often have displayed a lack of originality and bad timing when launching new funds. Since exchange-traded funds have taken all of the major indexes, those that have come late to the ETF rage have come out with incredibly narrow niche and enhanced index funds that defy logic.

Fidelity's New Campaign Focuses on Regular People

Hedge Funds Losing Luster Among Ultra-Wealthy

NEW YORK-Hedge funds can't run or hide from regulators, and the accredited investor, anti-fraud and insider trading rules will be three of the key issues the Securities and Exchange Commission will focus on this year, Bruce Karpati, assistant regional director at the SEC told attendees at the National Investment Company Service Association's "Alternative Investments Conference" here last week.

Investors Backlash Against 401(k)s Via Class-Actions

There is positively no shortage of exchange-traded funds to be had these days, and more inventive and narrowly focused products are emerging or in the wings.

With the stratospheric salaries that hedge fund managers are earning these days, there may be more to mutual fund managers' interest in employing hedge fund strategies than performance. Sure, they claim they're turning to riskier tactics to deliver better returns and distinguish themselves from the competition. In fact, many experts believe that mutual funds' use of hedge fund strategies is a growing trend and that the lines between institutional and retail investment strategies will blur.

Because managers of mutual funds and corporate executives who attended the same university frequently run in the same social circles or maintain their friendships well past graduation, the corporate executives tend to share key information about their firms with the portfolio managers, a new study found.