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Fidelity Investments on Wednesday announced the launch of four Fidelity Defined Maturity Funds, a series of four actively managed municipal income funds. The funds seek to bridge the gap between individual bonds and bond funds and, therefore, fill a gap in municipal bond investing, Fidelity said.

The hand-wringing over bank capital levels is pulling the spotlight off a bigger issue: effective oversight of the largest firms. In the wake of the crisis, regulators have forced banks to hold both a higher level and a higher quality of capital. They've created a tangle of complicated rules.

Responding to frustrated lawmakers who have yet to see the Obama administration give out any funds from its $30 billion small business lending program, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said Wednesday the fault lay with the banking regulators.

You might think that doing the most productive thing at every given moment means that you should always be working or always doing something tangible that moves you closer to your goals. In reality, top achievers realize that there are numerous “things” they can do, that on the surface may not appear to move them closer to their goals, but in fact actually do.

Will the new health plan law make health coverage more expensive for your firm or staff? The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation released a report this week saying that for companies with fewer than 50 workers, costs should drop. And if your firm employs 50 or more workers, costs might go up -- but only a little.

Conventional wisdom these days suggest that the U.S. dollar remains a safe haven for investors compared to the euro, which is under considerable pressure due to the growing debt crisis facing Greece and a few other European countries. But at least one analyst contends investors shouldn't be so quick to assume these macroeconomic developments are necessarily good for the U.S. dollar.

Morgan Keegan & Co. agreed to a $200 million settlement with the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) and five state securities regulators that resolves a civil case brought against the firm last year accusing top executives of defrauding investors by artificially inflating the value of mortgage-backed securities in several of its mortgage bond funds.

While the international millionaire population’s wealth rose past pre-crisis levels in 2010, wealth managers need to prepare as that demographic gradually shifts to younger clients, according to a new report released on Wednesday.

J.P. Morgan Securities LLC will pay $153.6 million to settle charges that it misled investors in a complex mortgage securities transaction just as the housing market was starting to plummet, the Securities and Exchange Commission said.

Despite a skittish U.S. economy, most commercial real estate investors remain upbeat and cautiously optimistic about the industry’s future, according to the PwC Real Estate Investor Survey. In fact, the majority continues to invest in all sectors of commercial real estate, as they continue to see signs that the industry’s fundamentals are stabilizing.