Money Management Executive Latest News

Piper Jaffray is in the market for an asset management firm, the firm's CEO, Andrew Duff, has recently indicated, Minneapolis St. Paul Business Journal reports. The move is rather surprising, given the fact Piper divested its asset management arm in 1998 when it split off from U.S. Bancorp by merging it into the bank's First American Asset Management division.

The chief executive officers of America's largest companies are grossly overpaid fat cats, Vanguard founder John Bogle told Dallas Morning News in a recent interview.

Mutual fund companies overwhelmingly vote in line with the recommendations of management at the firms in which they are invested. In 2005, funds voted with management 92% of the time, overwhelmingly rejecting shareholder proposals from unions, pensions and other stock owners, a study of the voting records of eight of the largest fund companies in the Boston area conducted by The Corporate Library for Boston Business Journal shows. Typically, those shareholder recommendations concern executive pay and voting rules.

While financial planners see a tremendous market in the years ahead for retirement income, they believe that the complexities of planning an income strategy for each client combined with compliance issues will keep that growth at a slow pace, according to a survey by the Financial Planning Association released Monday.

New reporting rules to trace possible money laundering by terrorists in mutual funds are likely to boost fund fees slightly, The Milwaukee Business Journal reports. The rules, which went into effect on June 5 and apply to transactions beginning Oct. 31 and beyond, are primarily increasing costs at transfer agents, although some fund companies might hire additional compliance staff to help scour for suspicious activity.

A California judge tossed out a shelf-space fraud case brought against St. Louis-based Edward Jones, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Equity mutual funds took a beating in May, with every single category in the red, except for utility and bear market funds, Chicago Tribune reports. And even that was unimpressive; utility funds eked out a scant 0.06% gain, while bear market funds rose 6%. It was the worst month for equity funds since July 2004.

Education lending giant Sallie Mae will acquire Upromise, a company that offers college savings plans. The value of the deal was not disclosed.

Fidelity Investments took in $5.8 billion in April, the biggest influx of cash since January 1996, Dow Jones reports. What drove that influx wasn't the markets or particularly strong performance but the scheduled closing of four major Fidelity funds to new investments by the end of the month -- the Fidelity Contrafund, Fidelity Mid-Cap Stock Fund, Fidelity Growth Company Fund and Fidelity Advisor New Insights Fund.

Mutual funds that invest in a wide array of investment styles are increasingly moving in tandem with the S&P 500, The Wall Street Journal reports, citing a report from Merrill Lynch.