Money Management Executive Latest News

The privatization of Social Security, high on President Bush's agenda this year, is not enough to address the program's looming shortfall, says House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Thomas (R-Calif.). At a pre-inaugural forum sponsored by National Journal magazine on Tuesday, Thomas said the problem of funding the Social Security system would not go away by creating personal accounts, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Hedge funds are unlikely to keep up with their gains of the past, according to a new study by Greenwich Associates. The study, released Tuesday, said that increasing assets, an abundance of new managers and a limited number of trading opportunities could restrain hedge fund performance this year.

Scandal be damned. Mutual funds had a fabulous 2004, Bloomberg News reports. Assets in U.S.-based stock, bond and money-market funds surged to $7.9 trillion last November, according to Investment Company Institute data, from $7.4 trillion at the end of 2003. To put that $500 billion increase in perspective, the entire fund industry consisted of $500 billion in 1985.

Cautious of practices like market timing and late trading, retirement plan providers are performing complete security checks of the mutual funds they entrust their investments to, Pensions and Investments reports .

Large-cap actively managed funds were the only sector that outperformed index funds in 2004

The lackluster stock market performance so far this year may foreshadow a weak year for equity fund investors who subscribe to a theory known as "the January effect," Reuters reports.

A disgruntled investment manager who was fired from Putnam Investments has slapped her former employer with a $25 million sex-discrimination lawsuit, accusing the firm of fomenting a chauvinistic work atmosphere, the Associated Press reports.

The 10 largest equity mutual funds of 1999 have seen their assets fall $138 billion as poor performance and scandals have sent investors fleeing, according to USA Today.

Only a few years ago exchange-traded funds were considered obscure investments, but today, serious investors are reportedly building entire portfolios from the fast-growing investment category through brokerage accounts, Dow Jones News reports.

Self-employed individuals are the latest group to be targeted by several asset management companies, which are providing them with individual 401(k)s, or solo 401(k)s, The Wall Street Journal reports.