Money Management Executive Latest News

The case that Massachusetts brought against Philip Goldstein’s Bulldog Investors hedge fund for soliciting investors over the Internet saw its first fireworks on Friday, when Bulldog filed a motion on Friday to have the Massachusetts Superior Court hear its case, HedgeWorld News reports. Bulldog wants its case heard in that venue rather than by the Massachusetts Securities Division so that it can mount a full defense, one centered on its First Amendment free speech rights. Goldstein says that the Division will not judge his case impartially.

Fidelity Investments is going to close down its 401(k) and enhance its 401(k) by raising company matches from 5% to 7%, the Associated Press reports. The company is also going to offer employees a health-savings credit they can use in retirement. Those who have existing pension benefits will be given the choice of rolling them into a profit-sharing plan or accepting them as annuities at retirement.

An NASD arbitration panel has ordered AllianceBernstein to pay a former top salesman $3.1 million, upholding his lawsuit against the firm for having been fired for his part in the firm’s mutual fund timing scandal, The Wall Street Journal reports. Charles Schaffran said the company defamed him.

Wells Fargo customers who have at least $25,000 in assets and/or loans can now make up to 100 free stock and no-load mutual fund trades a year, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. However, only 10% of a home mortgage can be counted toward the loan portion. Trades numbering above 100 a year will cost $5.95 apiece.

While the financial services industry grew an average of 3.5% between 2004 and 2005, it expanded only 1% in Massachusetts, Bloomberg reports, citing a new report from McKinsey. At this rate, the state is losing ground as one of the nation’s major finance hubs, the report concludes.

The U.S. Department of Labor has filed two lawsuits against Prime Care Services, the trustee of the 401(k) and pension plans in Southfield, Mich. The DOL says the trustee failed to close the plans and distribute $1,155,943 in assets to participants. The DOL wants to appoint an independent fiduciary to make the distributions.

A number of illegal funds that purport to deliver high returns in foreign investments are soliciting assets from Chinese investors, China Daily reports. One such fund, the Switzerland Mutual Fund, promises a 300% return within 450 days and has raised $12.9 million since it launched late last year.

The U.S. District Court of the Southern District of New York has upheld a $14 million award that a New York Stock Exchange arbitration panel awarded to three former Merrill Lynch brokers who lost their jobs for allegedly timing mutual funds, Dow Jones reports. The three, Christopher Chung, William Savino and Kevin Brunnock, were fired in October 2003.

Mercer Bullard, founder of Fund Democracy, doesn’t expect the Securities and Exchange Commission to pass the controversial rule that would require fund companies to have 75% of their boards, including the chairman, be independent, MarketWatch reports. But that isn’t stopping him from pressing the SEC to do what he believes is the right thing.

Janus paid its chief executive officer, Gary Black, $10.6 million in 2006, a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission shows. His based salary was $800,000 and the rest of his compensation was performance-based.