Money Management Executive Latest News

Frederick Marius has been named president of Quantitative Advisors of Lincoln, Mass., and executive vice president of the Quantitative Group of Funds. He was previously vice president and counsel at Putnam Investments of Boston.

The newly adopted rules that govern the personal trading practices of portfolio managers contain few changes from the SEC's original proposal four years ago, regulators, mutual fund lawyers and consultants said last week.

Closed-end fund activist Ronald Olin is having the misfortune of getting what he wished for in a unique closed-end fund fight.

Load funds are beginning to allow shareholders to purchase additional shares online.

Alliance Capital Management of New York is seeking permission from its unitholders to restructure so that its ownership is divided between publicly-traded units and units of a limited partnership which are not publicly traded.

Employees in defined contribution plans invested their money wisely enough to reap an average return of 11 percent between 1985 and 1995, on par with the 12 percent return that defined benefit pension plan portfolio managers averaged in those 11 years, according to KPMG, the New York accounting and consulting firm. KPMG based its figures on Form 5500 series reports that companies are required to file with the Internal Revenue Service. KPMG published its findings in the August issue of "Benefits Spectrum", a newsletter it sends to clients.

Although Congress included much of what the mutual fund industry sought in a major tax cut bill - the Financial Freedom Act of 1999 - that legislation is likely to be vetoed by President Clinton next month.

When Ryan Jacob became portfolio manager of The Internet Fund in late 1997, he thought it would be a lark. He never expected a fund that had only $200,000 in assets under management would achieve a return in 1998 of 196 percent, 113 percent in the first six months of 1999 and grow to $700 million in assets under management.

A former vice president of marketing for Fidelity Investments' bundled 401(k) program has introduced a new web site, Route401(k) (www.route401k.com), designed to help small retirement plan sponsors choose bundled 401(k) plans.

In an effort to keep up with its competition, the GE Funds managed by GE Investment Management of Stamford, Conn. is realigning the share classes on its 16 funds and is lowering the 12b-1 fees on its A shares. The changes reflect GE's desire to make the current share class lineup less confusing to current investors and more competitive in the marketplace, said a GE spokesperson.