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Now that Standard & Poor's has issued a negative credit watch on U.S. government debt and acknowledged the possibility that no deal will be reached to raise the government’s debt ceiling, what should investors do?

The tech team at Fidelity Institutional Wealth Services has come up with a new smartphone app that allows independent financial advisors to open client accounts and electronically trade for clients from anywhere.

Fund managers may be struggling to decide what new technology and operational procedures to implement to be able to trade interest-rate swaps and other derivative securities, as they move onto centrally cleared markets.

Lawrence Summers, former director of the National Economic Council, recently said, "The central irony of a financial crisis is that while it is caused by too much confidence, borrowing, lending and spending-it is resolved only by increases in confidence, borrowing, lending and spending."

To increase its presence in the bank channel for adviser-sold business, Russell Investments has promoted John Harrell and Paul Izzo to the newly created positions of national account executive.

Although worldwide assets under management rose 8% in 2010 from the previous year to $56.4 trillion and profit margins gained two percentage points to 33%, the industry faces a number of challenges for continued growth.

Americans' retirement expectations have changed dramatically in recent years. A vast majority now plan to live more frugally and delay retirement, SunAmerica Financial Group and Age Wave found in a survey of 1,001 people age 55 and older. Nonetheless, the majority are still confident they will be able to eventually retire.

In a world where the minute, second and even millisecond that you pull the trading trigger can materially affect the return you get, managers of mutual funds too often are slow to buy when prices are rising and too fast when prices are dropping.

Although fund managers say that preparing to comply with the provisions of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act is top of their agendas, they are pretty much in the dark about what to do, according to a survey conducted by SimCorp., a technology firm specializing in investment management.

There is a new dynamic today between hedge funds, investors and hedge fund administrators, according to State Street Corp.’s new Vision Report, “Hedge Funds: Rebuilding on a New Foundation.”

Even as unemployment numbers remain markedly high, the number of high-net worth individuals in the U.S. continued to increase in 2010, according to Capgemini’s 2011 U.S. Metro Wealth Index.

Eighty-seven percent of Americans with $500,000 or more in investable assets agree that the size of the U.S. government deficit is a major concern, a survey by research firm TNS found.

Charles Schwab is a bit late to the party with its new U.S. Aggregate Bond ETF -- but the company may use its brokerage platform to help even the playing field.

For years, PIMCO’s taxable bond Total Return Fund (PTTRX) has been a top-performer in its class, with five-star ratings from both Morningstar and S&P, five-year annualized trailing returns of 8.9%, and a manager, William Gross, widely respected as among one of the top in industry.

ProShares has launched the ProShares Hedge Replication ETF, benchmarked against Merrill Lynch’s hedge fund replication model.

Van Eck Global has launched the Market Vectors CEF Municipal Income ETF (ticker: XMPT), which it says is the first exchange-traded fund to focus on closed-end municipal bond funds.

T. Rowe Price has developed a free financial educational book for kids called “Journey to Your Dream Goal” that can be downloaded at the T. Rowe Price Family Center website.

Assets in exchange-traded funds in the U.S. will double to $2 trillion by 2015, according to a new report from BNY Mellon and Strategic Insight. Non-traditional investment strategies, which currently comprise 30% of ETF assets, will drive most of this growth, the two companies said.

Fifty-five percent of 401(k) participants say they would not be saving for retirement if it were not for their workplace savings plan, Fidelity Investments found in a survey of 1,000 participants and retirees. Additionally, 19% say they have no retirement savings outside of their 401(k) plan.

One year into the implementation of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, regulators need to work to ensure the future competitiveness of the U.S. market as the watershed legislation takes shape, industry officials said Wednesday.