Special Program Root Tag

Trust in the financial markets has improved, yet many Americans are still not investing. That’s according to a recent survey of 5,000 households by NFO WorldGroup for the Conference Board.

State Street Corp. has reported that its global philanthropy program made 225 grants totaling more than $3.6 million in the first half of 2003. The grants include $355,000 of future commitments, it said.

Despite well-publicized warnings about how to save for retirement, two studies indicate that workers and employers are shockingly overconfident and ill informed about basic matters of retirement saving.

Charles Schwab reported Wednesday second-quarter net income of $126 million, or 9 cents a share, a 29% increase from $98 million, or 7 cents a share, in the second quarter of 2002. The company attributed the increase to improvements in the securities markets, cost controls and a 9% increase in average daily trades of 141,000 throughout the quarter.

Affluent investors are selecting and retaining advisers on the basis of performance, according to a study released Monday by Fidelity Investments.

Mutuals.com, advisor of the Vice Fund, has issued a release noting that one-, three- and five-year performance studies of so-called "sin stock" industries – which include alcohol, gaming, tobacco and defense industries – have beaten the S&P 500. But the fund itself, just shy of a year old, has trailed the S&P 500. The Vice Fund is up 10.7% since the beginning of the year through July 22 and 4% since its launch last Aug. 30, whereas the S&P 500 is up 13% year to date and 8% since Aug. 30.

J.P. Morgan Chase is doing away with exit fees on seven of its funds by removing class B shares for the funds, Reuters reports.

Despite record low interest rates, money market fund assets have held their own, according to a survey from Moody’s Investors Service. In addition, the credit quality of money fund portfolios has remained high.

Three weeks after confirming it was in acquisition negotiations, Lehman Brothers signed an agreement Monday to acquire 100% of wealth manager Neuberger Berman for a total price of $2.63 billion in cash and Lehman stock. Neuberger, which manages 29 open-end mutual funds in addition to $24 billion for wealthy investors, will become part of Lehman Brothers’ Client Services Wealth and Asset Management Business, and will retain the Neuberger moniker.

The National Association of Securities Dealers task force on mutual fund breakpoints issued its report Tuesday, calling upon every link in the mutual fund distribution chain to facilitate price breaks for eligible customers.

Investor confidence in the financial markets is slowly improving, as a report showed equity mutual fund flows for June hit their highest level in more than a year.

Investors added $600 million to stock-based mutual funds in the week ending last Wednesday, according to data from TrimTabs.com, Dow Jones reports. The week before, inflows stood at $2.9 billion.

Vontobel Asset Management and Salus Capital Management have launched the Salus Market Neutral Fund, an open-ended company based in the Cayman Islands. Vontobel’s role will be that of investment manager and Salus will serve as sub-investment manager.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has filed charges against three registered representatives and an advisory firm, alleging they defrauded their customers by withholding vital information about class B shares of mutual funds.

According to Boston Consulting Group, wealth managers’ assets under management have dropped by 14% and their revenues have fallen 25% in the past four years. Boston Consulting revealed these findings in a report entitled Winning in a Challenging Market: Global Wealth 2003, based on interviews with 80 of the world’s leading wealth managers, with $5 trillion in assets under management.

Some fund watchers are calling for fund managers to put their money where their mouth is, so to speak. Although fund managers stake their reputation and bonus on the funds they manage, critics are asserting that they should be putting their own money on the line, just like the shareholders, Reuters reports.

State securities regulators are turning up the heat on Morgan Stanley after discovering it provided false and misleading information about its mutual fund sales practices.

Banks are positioned to corner the mass-affluent market, as separately managed account firms and other wealth managers choose to ignore investors with less than $500,000 of assets in order to pursue the ultra-wealthy, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).

A three-year bear market has left wealthy investors groping in the dark, but with plenty of cash still sitting on the sidelines separately managed accounts may serve as a beacon of hope for recovery.

The AIP Alpha Strategies I Fund has dared to go where no other open-end mutual fund has tread before: into the hedge fund realm. The fund is the first to offer a variety of hedge fund investment techniques packaged as an open-end mutual fund sporting continuous sales of shares, daily liquidity and transparency of all securities, both long and short.