Money Management Executive Latest News

Constricted by tight marketing and advertising budgets, small fund companies are using a variety of unconventional marketing strategies to sell their funds and increase brand awareness, according to mutual fund marketing executives.

WASHINGTON - Investors are not the only ones interested in hot initial public offerings.

WASHINGTON - It might not be as easy as it seems to allow investors to take all of their funds with them when they switch broker/dealers.

NEW YORK - Fund companies interested in tapping into the growth of overseas mutual fund markets should consider foreign supermarkets, said John Payne, a consultant with Cerulli Associates of Boston.

Mutual fund companies face the prospect of a new SEC examination next year that has little to do with the agency's traditional scrutiny of securities practices and procedures.

WASHINGTON - The SEC expects to propose, this month, new rules for Form ADV, the main disclosure document that investment advisers must file with the agency, said Robert Plaze, associate director of the SEC. The SEC expects the form ultimately will be available on the Internet for investors to review, Plaze said. Plaze spoke here March 4 at an industry conference sponsored by The Practicing Law Institute of New York.

Kinetics Asset Management of White Plains, N.Y., with $1.6 billion in assets under management, is hoping to attract more assets to its five Internet funds with its first television commercials. Three 15-second ads began running on CNBC, CNN, CNNfn and Bloomberg News in late February.

Waddell & Reed Financial of Overland Park, Kan., has announced it plans to acquire The Legend Group, a mutual fund distribution and retirement planning company based in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., for $61 million in cash and contingent cash payments of up to $14 million over three years.

Web Street Securities of Chicago, an online brokerage firm, has eliminated the commissions it charges on purchases, sales and exchanges of over 4,000 mutual funds it offers to online investors. The move propels Web Street Securities ahead of more than 160 online brokerage firm competitors, making it the first such firm to offer investors free mutual fund trades.

For a limited time through March 31, Federated Investors of Pittsburgh is waiving the front-end sales charge on four of its newer equity funds - the Federated Aggressive Growth Fund, the Federated Large Cap Growth Fund, the Federated International Small Company Fund, and the Federated Communications Technology Fund.