Money Management Executive Latest News

The NASD fined four brokerage firms $850,000 for failing to waive front-end sales charges for customers buying Class A shares by not having adequate supervisory systems and procedures in place. In addition, the companies must repay $43.8 million to the overcharged customers.

The Ghost of Christmas Past seemed to float through the Securities and Exchange Commission's end-of-year meeting, with regulators re-visiting the haunting issues of hedge fund regulation and the composition of mutual fund boards.

BOSTON-DWS Scudder plans to grow with the aging.

NEW YORK-The market has the potential to perform well next year, better than this year, as the pre-presidential election cycle begins, the Federal Reserve has been pausing rates and investor confidence is high, all factors that could influence next year, experts say.

Responding to an influx of applications for new exchange-traded funds, the Securities and Exchange Commission is reportedly working on a new rule that would speed up their approval process. Because the products are hybrids somewhere in between stocks and mutual funds, they currently have to apply for exemptive relief.

William Galvin, Massachusetts secretary of the commonwealth, has taken issue with a recent Wall Street Journal editorial praising the proposed merger of the regulatory units of the NASD and the New York Stock Exchange.

Confidence among wealthy investors declined last month for the first time in three months, according to an index compiled by Spectrem Group. The Spectrem Millionaire Investor Index fell three points from October, to 12, after two months of steady increases. The index, which had risen two points in October and 12 in September, remained in mildly bullish territory, despite the November decline.

Wilmington Trust Selects Gaynor, Urbon as Advisers

Now that the Pension Protection Act extends 529 college savings plan features that were set to expire after 2010-the most important being tax-free withdrawals-assets in 529 plans could surge even faster than the 30% clip at which they have been growing over the past two years. Last year, assets in 529s rose 30.8% to $68.4 billion, and this year, they've risen another 31.5% to $90 billion, according to data from Financial Research Corp. and the College Savings Plan Network.

Fidelity Investments is expanding its wealth management service offerings to high-net-worth clients with a new program ,Wealth Advisor Solutions. The program offers Fidelity’s customers the ability to establish relationships with qualified, independent registered investment advisor clients of Fidelity.Customers will receive personalized services offered by fee-based advisors, as well as investment advice and access to a broad range of investment products and services. These might include separately managed accounts, discretionary management using individual securities, wealth preservation, legacy planning and wealth transfer strategies.