Portfolio

Nuveen Investments of Chicago plans to introduce the first exchange-traded funds to track U.S. Treasury indexes, according to the company. The five new funds, called Fixed Income Trust Receipts, will be based on indexes of one, two, five and 10-year treasury issues and 20-year STRIPs - separately-traded registered interest and principal securities, Nuveen said.

State Farm Insurance of Bloomington, Ill. has announced that it has begun offering 10 State Farm mutual funds in North Carolina, Virginia, Missouri and Kansas. State Farm Insurance plans to offer the mutual funds to customers throughout the United States by March, according to the company.

Aetna Funds, a division of Aeltus Investment Management of Hartford, Conn. will add a sixth fund to its Principal Protection Funds series of guaranteed mutual funds in April 2001, according to Aetna.

Berger Funds of Denver announced that it is revising the investment strategy of the Berger Growth and Income Fund. The fund, which will be renamed the Berger Large Cap Growth Fund, will no longer seek income as part of its investment objective, and will concentrate solely on investment growth within the large cap market, according to the announcement.

Enterprise Group of Funds of Atlanta has announced plans to introduce a mutual fund focused on corporate takeovers. Enterprise will launch the Enterprise Mergers and Acquisitions Fund in the first quarter of 2001, the company announced.

PNC Advisors, the high net worth wealth management division of PNC Financial Services of Pittsburgh, has filed with the SEC to launch a new family of funds of funds using the funds and investment capabilities of its investment advisory affiliate BlackRock, Inc. of New York. The funds will cater to the needs of affluent investors.

The past year was one in which fund alternatives - from managed separate accounts and online portfolio products to hedge funds and exchange-traded funds - earned respect, if somewhat grudgingly, from the fund industry.

If there is a stock index to track, chances are good that there is an exchange-traded fund based on that index. So far, however, there is not an exchange-traded fund that tracks a socially-responsible index of stocks. But, that may soon change, according to industry analysts and executives.

ProFunds of Bethesda, Md., which plans to introduce a line of six new exchange-traded funds, five of which will track the Standard & Poor's 500 Index, does not have the right to do so, according to Bill Jordan, a spokesperson for McGraw-Hill Companies of New York, Standard & Poor's parent company.

Barclays Global Investors of San Francisco is adding 10 new exchange-traded funds to its line up of iShares exchange-traded funds, according to a preliminary prospectus filed late last month with the Securities and Exchange Commission.