Money Management Executive Latest News

The American Stock Exchange is working actively to wrest some of the close-end fund business from the Big Board, Dow Jones Newswires reports. The new battle between the exchanges echoes their fight for exchange traded funds, as Mutual Fund Market News reported last summer.

Peter Mangan is no stranger to independent financial advisers, which is exactly why he left his alma mater, TD Waterhouse, last year to start a new San Diego-based brokerage firm, Shareholder Services Group.

Life insurers should beware if interest rates remain at all-time lows, according to a report from Fitch Ratings. Even so, a prolonged period of low interest rates will most likely affect company balance sheets but does not threaten solvency.

Mario Gabelli, the well-known mutual fund manager and head of the money management company that bears his name, took a 20% pay cut last year, as his portfolios sagged amid a bear market.

Mutual fund giant Fidelity Investments has expanded its Premium 401(k) Program to include nine additional mutual funds, the company announced yesterday. The program is made up of a variety of employer-sponsored plans offered by third-party financial advisers to small and mid-sized companies.

Van Global Hedge Fund Index, a benchmark of hedge fund performance run by Van Hedge Fund Advisors International, rose 0.4% in March, net of fees, reversing a 0.2% decline in February, according to a preliminary report. Excluding fund of funds, the index rose 0.5% for the month. Within that universe, 63% of the more than 800 participating funds showed a positive return in March. However, only one-third of those funds managed to outpace the S&P 500, which posted a 1% gain.

When Fidelity talks, people listen, so when the nation’s biggest mutual fund company released its March monthly report yesterday, newshounds were quick to analyze changes to its holdings.

The Reserve Funds ranked as the fastest-growing money fund complex in 2003, ending the first quarter with $24 billion in assets under management, according to The Money Fund Report. That represents a 24% increase in the first quarter from the same period a year ago.

WASHINGTON – William J. McDonough, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, isn’t retiring after all.

BlackRock Inc. announced yesterday that its earning rose 12% in the first quarter.