Portfolio

Mary Jo White was sworn in this morning as the 31st Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A quarterly Northern Trust survey of investment managers reveals that they were optimistic about the U.S. economy in the first quarter of 2013, buoyed by their positive expectations for housing, jobs and corporate profits in the face of across-the-board federal budget cuts went into effect on March 1.

The Financial Services Institute is heralding the advance of legislation in Florida that would significantly ease the registration process for advisors representing firms headquartered in other states.

During the week ended April 3, investors withdrew an estimated $1.83 billion from U.S. equity funds, the most they have pulled from the funds in a single week this year.

“We have found that people in Gen Y not only said they are highly disciplined, they really are more highly disciplined than people in older generations,” Bill Taylor, vice president of financial planning at Northwestern Mutual, said in an interview. “It might be because they’ve seen their parents hurt badly when stocks fell in 2008, because of the decline of defined benefit plans, or just because young people have access to more information today.”

Chicago-based Dearborn Partners has launched its first mutual fund, dubbed the Dearborn Partners Rising Dividend Fund (DRDAX, DRDCX and DRDIX).

Direxion has added two new leveraged exchange-traded funds: the Direxion Daily Brazil Bull 3x Shares (BRZU) and Direxion Daily South Korea Bull 3x Shares (KORU), to its portfolio.

Putnam Investments has added three new DCIO Investment Specialists to bolster its sales effort in the 401(k) market.

Russell Investments has appointed Andrew Scherer as director of defined contribution, intermediary distribution for the firm’s U.S. advisor-sold business, which sells mutual funds and other multi-asset products to DC recordkeeping platforms, retirement plan sponsors and retirement plan advisors.

The suitability of leveraged and inverse exchange-traded funds climbed on FINRA’s Enforcement hit list in 2012, according to Partners Deborah Heilizer and Brian Rubin and Associate Andrew McCormick of law firm Sutherland Asbill & Brennan’s, in their annual review of the regulatory agency’s disciplinary actions.