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Hoping to cash in on an aging Japanese population that's funneling its retirement savings into bank deposits in the face of a pension pinch, Fidelity Investments will launch three funds that focus on paying dividends, Bloomberg recently reported.

Assets and the number of plans in Fidelity Investments' Advisor 401(k) programs, designed for small- and mid-sized employers, increased in 2005. Assets increased 16% over the year before, to $13.5 billion, while the number of new plans Fidelity signed up rose 44%, to 380, bringing the total number of plans using Fidelity's Advisor 401(k) services to 2,176.

MIAMI - With the whirlwind of legislation that started with the mutual fund scandals in 2003 seemingly subsiding, fund companies can stop scurrying to comply and do a better job of focusing on existing rules, speakers at The National Investment Company Service Association summit here said last week.

The recent marriage between Merrill Lynch's investment management unit and fixed-income manager BlackRock did more than create a $1 trillion colossus. It would also seem that it has left Morgan Stanley desperately seeking a new mate.

NEW YORK - Let's just say they agree to disagree.

Newly minted Securities and Exchange Commission General Counsel Brain Cartwright told the Mutual Fund Directors Forum that going forward, independent directors would serve as the centerpiece of the mutual fund regulatory regime.

Strong inflows and a robust stock market are driving continued growth in the mutual fund industry in 2006, Strategic Insight reported last week. Assets in mutual funds in the U.S. reached $9.9 trillion at the end of January. Of particular note, Strategic Insight pointed out that inflows to international equity funds were nearly $30 billion in January, twice the previous monthly record.

On the heels of its deal with BlackRock and pressure from Princeton University, Merrill Lynch has decided not to name its mutual funds unit Princeton Portfolio Research and Management. The university had protested Merrill's right to the name, even though Merrill Lynch Investment Managers is in the Princeton area, for fear that investors might think there was a connection between Merrill and the university's endowment.

Robert S. Tull Moves From SEC's Philadelphia Office To Consulting Firm

MIAMI - While employers at home are increasingly abandoning defined benefit plans in favor of defined contribution programs, other countries are following suit, said Jay Hooley, executive vice president of State Street Corp. of Boston.

Mutual fund shareholders are more likely than all Americans to have Internet access, according to a new report from the Investment Company Institute of Washington. In 2005, 88% of mutual fund shareholders had access to the Web, compared to 79% of all Americans. This is up from 2000, when 68% of mutual fund shareholders had access to the Web, versus 57% of all Americans.

Employee participation in 401(k) plans continued to decrease in 2005, to a participation rate of 70%, down 12.5% from 80% in 1999, and the percentage of salary contributed has fallen 20% in that time, from 8.6% to 6.9%, according to the Spectrem Group study, "2005 Defined Contribution Market Needs."

The National Association of Securities Dealers and the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board have issued a joint statement promising cooperation to harmonize mutual fund and 529 plan sales rules, as there is heightened concern over lack of regulatory consistency.

International Management Associates is a $150 million hedge fund firm that has collapsed and Kirk Wright, the hedge fund firm's manager, has evidently gone incognito, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Lehman Brothers may be forging a future of "unbundled" fees, through which mutual fund companies pay for research, rather than build the cost into the commissions customers pay on trades, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Practice makes perfect, and mutual fund management is no exception, according to Bloomberg columnist Chet Currier.

The New York Stock Exchange has proposed that the NASD form a joint venture with it, in an effort to equally regulate brokerage firms, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Employee participation in 401(k) plans continued to decrease in 2005, to a participation rate of 70%, down 12.5% from 80% in 1999, and the percentage of salary contributed has fallen 20% in that time, from 8.6% to 6.9%, according to the Spectrem Group study "2005 Defined Contribution Market Needs."

Baltimore-based T. Rowe Price Group is planning to acquire the Preferred Group mutual fund family, which is currently being advised by Caterpillar Investment Management, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Due to heightening concerns of investors over identify theft, Charles Schwab & Co. is giving its investors a guarantee that it will cover 100% of losses having to do with unauthorized activity in investors' online brokerage accounts, according to MarketWatch.com.