Money Management Executive Latest News

The Securities and Exchange Commission plans to revisit the independent chairman rule, along with mutual fund fees, particularly 12b-1 fees, and disclosure, The Wall Street Journal reports, citing remarks by SEC Chairman Christopher Cox before the Mutual Fund Directors Forum.

Edward Jones is proposing paying investors $127.5 million in vouchers to settle class-action lawsuits that it accepted revenue from mutual fund companies in exchange for recommending their funds, St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports.

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.

The Central Bank of Bahrain has established new regulations for collective investment undertakings (CIU), which cover hedge funds, derivatives and other alternative investments, along with mutual funds, lawandtax-news.com reports. The bank will issue the new regulations later this month. They will require hedge funds to register.

Ron Speaker, who was with Janus for two decades and has run the $757 million Janus Flexible Bond Fund since 1992, is leaving the firm in June, Rocky Mountain News reports. At that point, Gibson Smith and Darrell Watters will co-manage the fund.

As the number of companies restating their financials increases—affecting not only their own management but also mutual fund companies and investors—businesses have begun to call on the Securities and Exchange Commission to make dramatic changes to the Sarbanes-Oxley accounting rules, Business Week reports.

Mutual fund companies are increasingly looking around the world for areas to growth through mergers and acquisitions, The Wall Street Journal reports.

As part of a $200 million expansion into Texas that will eventually employ 1,535 additional employees, Fidelity Investments recently signed a 10-year lease for 160,000 square feet in Lewisville, Texas outside of Dallas to support as many as 1,000 employees, bizjournals.com reports.

Two former Prudential Investment Management execs have sued the firm in federal court for forcing them out after they complained that Prudential changed the investment objective for a number of municipal bond funds they managed without notifying the board or asking shareholders for their approval, the Newark Star-Ledger reports. The two are Robert Waas, a former managing director, and Robert Germano, a former senior portfolio manager.

NEW YORK—The “Ancient Regime” is over, and fund companies can anticipate fewer lawsuits from shareholders over what they claim are excessive fees, according to panelists at the Practising Law Institute’s Investment Management Institute 2007 here last Friday.