Special Program Root Tag

Mellon Financial Corp. hardly sounds done making acquisitions to expand its private wealth management unit, which includes separately managed accounts.

Struggling to maintain profitability in 529 plans and facing low general public awareness about the products, firms are increasingly adding features and catering to the needs of the high-net-worth client, hoping to snag the bigger fishes in the investment pond.

Amvescap's independent trustees are seeking permission to ask shareholders to approve the merging of the boards of its subsidiaries AIM and Invesco. The trustees, in a registration statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, say this will be the second step in Amvescap's plan to merge all of its North American fund operations, the first step being AIM becoming the distributor for all of the funds.

Taking advantage of the expiration of its five-year contract with TIAA-CREF on July 30, New York State's College Savings Program has selected Columbia Management Group, a division of Fleet Bank, and Vanguard to manage its $1.8 billion 529 plan.

Employers expanded the number of 401(k) plans in the nation by 4% in 2002, according to the National Defined Contribution Council (NDCC) and the Spectrem Group.

Janus reported second-quarter earnings of $47.5 million, or 21 cents a diluted share, a 36% decline from $73.7 million, or 33 cents a diluted share in the second quarter of 2002.

Roger Edelen, formerly a professor at Wharton Business School, has joined ReFlow Management as managing director of research. Edelen is an expert in portfolio risk, fair value and portfolio turnover.

Eric Anderson has joined BISYS as president of its education and licensing services division. Anderson, who reports to Joe Suquet, president of BISYS' insurance and education services group, was previously with S1 Corp.

Lisa Baird left her position as a senior analyst with Cerulli Associates to join CRA Business Strategies Group, a consultant to the investment management industry, as director of research. Having also worked at Fidelity Institutional Retirement Services Co. and McKinsey & Co., Baird has experience in strategy development, product marketing and distribution, channel strategy and market research. She reports to Frank L. Tarantino, executive vice president for strategic consulting.

Tom Robinson has been promoted from chief investment officer to president of Oppenheimer Asset Management. "Tom is a visionary and a well-respected leader within Oppenheimer Asset Management and throughout our organization," said Albert G. Lowenthal, chairman and CEO of Fahnestock Viner Holdings, the parent company of Oppenheimer. "Having Tom at the helm of this critical business unit is a move that we think will result in continued growth and expansion."

Jeff Joseph has joined Rydex Capital Partners as a managing director to help the firm expand its hedge fund business. Rydex launched a hedge fund of funds called the Rydex Sphinx Fund earlier this year.

Vanguard Group plans to beef up its fund lineup by adding 11 new index funds and 20 ETF versions of its mutual funds.

The real estate sector is being pegged as a pullback candidate, but that hasn't stopped new money from pouring into these funds.

Mark-to-market activities in the loan marketplace, whereby a bank loan fund's book value is adjusted to reflect its current market value, are in a state of transition. Regulatory non-compliance as dictated by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and risk of investor litigation when funds are discovered to be improperly valued, no longer allows funds to carry all of their loans at par, or original issue value, unless they are in default.

The majority of the leaders of U.S. multinational corporations are optimistic about the prospects for the economy over the next 12 months, PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Management Barometer survey found. Sixty percent said they are optimistic about the U.S. economy and 42% said they are confident about the world economy. That was up markedly from the first quarter, when only 34% said they were upbeat on the U.S. economy and only 28% were optimistic about international prospects.

BISYS has won an exemptive order from the Securities and Exchange Commission to allow 12 of its mutual fund clients to invest greater amounts of non-money market funds in affiliated money market funds. The order will allow each of the funds to invest as much as 25% of total assets in un-invested cash or cash collateral raised through securities lending. The previous statutory limits would only permit a single fund to invest no more than 5% of its assets or a maximum of $2.5 million in an affiliated money market fund, and for all of the funds in a complex to invest no more than 10% of their assets.

While the SEC and Congress consider regulating the hedge fund industry, the Managed Funds Association has issued guidelines for its member hedge fund managers to follow. The guidelines suggest best practices for monitoring various types of risk; fair, consistent and verifiable valuation policies; compliance with regulation; and disaster recovery and business continuity practices.

American retailers have long wooed shoppers with discounts or special sales. Now, a handful of fund companies are beginning to catch onto the trend, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Pioneer Alternative Investment Management, the alternative investment arm of Pioneer Global Asset Management, has registered a new hedge fund-of-funds with the Security and Exchange Commission.

In response to the increasing concerns of American workers about their retirement savings, Principal Financial Group is now allowing its clients to offer plan participants a consolidated retirement savings – combining all of their retirement savings into one complete package.