Portfolio

Mutual funds took in $11.05 billion for the week ended July 22, up sharply from the $6.6 billion they netted the previous week, the Investment Company Institute said. The inflows were the highest since the week ended June 17, when long-term mutual funds took in $11.1 billion.

A full 66% of investors do not expect the economy to improve until next year or even later, and only 34% peg improvement for this year, online brokerage TradeKing found in a survey of 3,000 of its customers.

Morgan Stanley Smith Barney has added a fixed income annuity from Nationwide to its unified managed account platform, so that investors have the option of selecting lifetime income. The brokerage is calling the option Select Retirement.

Exchange-traded funds have attracted $35 billion so far this year, far less than in previous years, but growth is likely to return at a rapid clip once the recession winds down, according to Strategic Insight. By comparison, investors have withdrawn $49 billion from mutual funds.

The web-based 401(k) software has created a Plan Management Dashboard that rates plans for sponsors and advisers and how the scores compare to similar plans.

Fidelity Investments is giving its retail and institutional brokerage clients access to the initial public offerings and follow-on equity offerings underwritten by Deutsche Bank.

Between November and March, hedging programs at variable annuity firms supported 94% of their guarantees, up from 93% in the prior period, Milliman said.

UBS has stopped selling leveraged exchange-traded funds, saying that the funds don’t conform to its belief in long-term investing due to the “short-term nature of these securities.”

Securian Retirement is urging sponsors that offer stable-value funds in their 401(k) plan to be aware that there can still be risks in such funds, depending on their holdings and the stability of the financial markets. Such funds need to be monitored, Securian says.

Putnam Investments is planning to cut the fees on many of its funds and tie the fees to the performance of a number of its funds, the company announced Tuesday.