Money Management Executive Latest News

Merrill Lynch has tapped BISYS to act as its transfer agent for the Dublin-based UCITS umbrella fund it launched last month, the Merrill Lynch Global Selects Portfolios. Comprised of 42 portfolios covering diverse investment sectors, from equity to short-term securities, the fund is soon to be launched in Asia as well.

Equity fund investors have paid 11% more in fees, all the while their investments have fallen during the bear market, according to a report by the General Accounting Office expected to be released at today’s Congressional hearing on the fund industry.

Mellon is moving down under with the opening of its first office in Australia, in Sydney, New South Wales, the company announced Tuesday. As the new head of Mellon Global Investments Australia Ltd., James Gruver’s immediate goal will be to grow Mellon's asset management business in Australia, which Mellon is calling "a strategic market." Mellon manages A$1 billion of institutional money in the country.

While college savings plans are becoming more mainstream, and states are increasingly offering services via the Web, many sites have still haven’t gotten the ABCs down when it comes to offering basic features important to investors on their sites, according to a recent kasina study.

Confidence in mutual funds and in the stock market overall has tumbled by almost half in the last year, according to a nationwide Internet study by marketing research and consulting firm Decision Analyst, conducted last month.

A new report issued this afternoon by securities regulators shows that nearly one in three sales of front-end-load mutual funds between November 2002 and January 2003 did not receive the breakpoint sales charge it should have.

Janus’ Risk-Managed Stock Fund (MFMN 3/4/03), the Columbia Thermostat Fund (MFMN 3/7/03) and Fidelity’s temporary elimination of the Contrafund front-end load, are three of the latest examples of the fund industry’s attempt to lure back disenchanted investors, Reuters reported. And while the industry has resisted changing or even firing managers (MFMN 2/10/03), Neuberger Berman recently fired its growth managers and replaced them with a team from Northern Trust.

One the anniversary of Nasdaq’s March 10, 2000 5,048 high, and at a time when 700 companies have been delisted from the exchange over the past three years, Nasdaq is looking at other trading opportunities, The New York Post reports.

San Francisco-based Van Wagoner Capital Management, which once scored soaring returns thanks to bets on tech firms, has had miserable performance since the tech bubble burst. As returns suffered, investors pulled their money out of the company’s funds.

Mutual fund directors, 50% of whom are independent, are nonetheless a "mockery of stewardship," Warren Buffet told Berkshire Hathaway shareholders in his annual letter, The Wall Street Journal reports.