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In 2011, 401(k) plans will turn 30, but the milestones the mutual fund industry has reached in this time are but a nanosecond in the history of U.S. retirement policy.

Predicting a positive but shaky year ahead, alternative investors are looking abroad to reap the benefits of the global recovery.

NEW YORK -- In the aftermath of the global recession, regulators from developed nations are working with financial industry leaders to build a new foundation for a more balanced global economy less susceptible to worldwide crises.

BOSTON -- Longtime industry veteran Dan Fuss, the 76-year-old vice chairman and managing director of Loomis, Sayles & Co., knows that the Federal Reserve has to raise interest rates eventually. This could dramatically affect credit spreads, yield curves and other macroeconomic issues. But until such a move takes place, there is no need to get excited.

Wherever the money's going, it's not going to municipal bond mutual funds.

With the fund industry landscape constantly changing in response to the credit crisis, Money Management Executive asked Matt Ward, Head of Fund Administration, North America, Northern Trust, for his insights on how fund administrators are being affected.

As the private-label mortgage bond market comes back to life, real estate investment trusts may play the lucrative central role that belonged to banks and Wall Street firms during securitization's pre-crisis heyday.

The more things change, the more they remain the same. In the early 1980s, the nation faced a serious retirement challenge, with Social Security estimated to have unfunded liabilities of about $6 trillion and worries about whether the Greatest Generation would be able to afford its retirement.

The aftershocks of the financial crisis have left us with fewer distributors, increased investment scrutiny by analysts, and the most severe competition for assets in the history of the industry.

The 30th anniversary of the first 401(k) savings plan which I designed is rapidly approaching on Jan. 1, 2011, making this an appropriate time to briefly consider how 401(k) has impacted our retirement system.