Portfolio

Charles Schwab Investment Management of San Francisco is taking steps to provide more investment flexibility for the managers of Schwab's four MarketManager funds of funds.

Retirement is the main reason people save and invest in only three of ten leading nations - in the U.S., Germany and the U.K., according to a survey commissioned by American Express of Minneapolis, Minn. People in France, Hong Kong, Italy, Singapore and Taiwan save money to have a cushion in case of an emergency, particularly in case of being laid off from their jobs.

Most employers are outsourcing their retirement plans, but a large number are not paying much attention to how well their plans are being managed for them, according to a study completed this summer for Delaware Investments of Philadelphia by Greenwald & Associates of Washington, D.C. It may be because of the bull market, according to one Delaware executive.

Only six percent of 401(k) plan participants who switch jobs roll their money over to the incumbent 401(k) provider, according to a study. Thirty-seven percent of participants place their savings in an IRA, according to the study by Hewitt Associates, the management consulting firm in Lincolnshire, Ill. Hewitt's analysis of 193,000 defined contribution distributions nationwide in 1998 also showed that 57 percent of the investors chose to cash out of their plans.

Retirement planning and retirement plans are key factors in mutual fund sales and offer an opportunity for growth for the industry, a new Investment Company Institute report suggests.

Actively-managed mutual funds have been out of favor in recent months because of two rapidly developing trends. Funds pegged to a market index, like Standard & Poor's 500, have gained in popularity, not only because they can outperform many actively-managed funds, but because they take less of a bite out of an investor's earnings through low management fees. In addition, the popularity of Internet stocks has drawn investors away from activelymanaged funds to invest in individual Internet stocks.

Like Frankenstein and his monster, RREEF America of Chicago is bringing a mutual fund back to life. The money manager is bringing out a twin of one of its old real estate funds even though it merged a similar fund with American Century Investments of Kansas City, Mo. two years ago.

Money managers, mostly small ones, have been registering Internet fund products with the SEC at a rapid rate.

Charles Schwab & Co. of San Francisco is offering investors a means of participating in some of the potentially high returns of Internet stocks while taking little risk. Schwab is offering two equity-linked certificates of deposit that are federally insured. One of the new CDs has a maturity value linked to the return of the Chicago Board Options Exchange Internet index, said Leslie L. Durschinger, Schwab vice president. The other CD's maturity value is linked to the return of the S&P 500, Durschinger said.

The City of New York's 457 deferred compensation plan, which has $250 million in assets under management, in November will begin offering employees a separate account managed by Citizens Advisers of Portsmouth, N.H. Citizens is the investment adviser to the socially- and environmentally- responsible Citizens Funds.