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Investment Advisers of Minneapolis, Minn. has settled a lawsuit brought against it by a would-be purchaser of a private security the firm held in its IAI Growth & Income Fund, according to a source close to IAI. Terms of the settlement were not disclosed. The security is now in the process of being sold.

The money management industry had become an outpost for scoundrels in the 1930s.

OppenheimerFunds of New York is planning to offer a new technology fund.

Marianne K. Smythe, a partner in the law firm of Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering of Washington, is chairperson of the Mutual Funds and Investment Management Conference sponsored by the Investment Company Institute and Federal Bar Association being held this week in Palm Desert, Calif. Smythe is a former director and associate director of the SEC's division of investment management. She recently spoke with Mutual Fund Market News reporter Mike Garrity. An edited account of their conversation follows.

Pending legislation in the European Parliament of Luxembourg would allow mutual funds registered in one European country to automatically qualify for a pan-European "passport" that would allow them to sell throughout the European Union. If the bill passes, funds would no longer be required to register in each country. A vote on the bill is expected by late summer.

Lens Investment Management of Portland, Maine has nominated yet another director for the board of The Pioneer Group of Boston, Lens Investment Management announced today. Lens owns approximately 4.1 percent of Pioneer's stock.

Phil Goldstein - the closed-end fund investor, fund director and leader of proxy fights - is running for the board of directors for the Italy Fund. Goldstein, president of Opportunity Partners LP of Pleasantville, N.Y., plans to spend $30,000 in a campaign to persuade shareholders to elect him and fellow Italy Fund investor Glenn Goodstein of Encino, Calif., to the board. Goldstein also is asking shareholders to vote in favor of opening the Italy Fund, according to the proxy statement. Such a move will eliminate what Goldstein described as chronic discounts to the fund's net asset value.

A federal district court judge has dismissed a lawsuit against T. Rowe Price Associates of Baltimore in which shareholders in the Rowe Price-Fleming International Stock Fund claimed they paid excessive fees. Fund lawyers said the decision provides new clarity about the minimum allegations a shareholder must make for an excessive fee case to be heard.

Legg Mason of Baltimore, Md. has agreed to acquire Perigee, the ninth largest Canadian-based money management firm, based in Toronto. The acquisition will be structured as a stock swap. The firm's principals will remain. Perigee will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Legg Mason.

The SEC has fined and censured the adviser to an Internet fund for failing to file the proper Y2K forms.

Conseco Capital Management, the money management arm of Conseco, the insurance, mutual fund and financial services company of Carmel, Ind., will buy the adviser to the StockCar Stocks Index Fund, according to a proxy statement the fund filed with the SEC March 1. Conseco will pay up to $5 million over four years to buy the fund's adviser, StockCar Stocks Advisors, LLC of Mooresville, N.C., according to the proxy statement. The exact purchase price will be determined by future fund sales, according to the proxy statement.

The Managers International Equity Fund has hired a third manager to sub-advise a portion of the $675 million fund.

KPMG LLP of New York last week saved itself and the accounting industry from the potential of a court case that could have expanded the liability of accountants who audit mutual funds.

Within the next year, the mutual fund industry can expect to see a new share class attached to some equity funds that allows them to be traded throughout the day and includes features common to exchange-traded funds, according to executives in the mutual fund industry.

Maryland's highest court last week dealt a setback to that state's legislature and the mutual fund industry in the ongoing fight over what makes a mutual fund director independent.

SEC officials last week outlined a rule proposal on how mutual funds should report their after-tax returns.

NEW YORK - Amerindo Investment Advisors of New York plans to launch two new technology-related mutual funds, as well as a clone of its flagship Amerindo Technology Fund.

The SEC has denied several fund companies' requests to raise redemption fees above two percent because a hike would go beyond the costs associated with redeeming shares and would instead act as a penalty, said Cindy Fornelli, senior advisor to SEC director Paul Roye.

More than one-third of people who invest in IRAs, plan to use them as investment vehicles to bequeath money to their children or other heirs, according to a survey by American Skandia Life Assurance of Shelton, Conn.

WASHINGTON - The regulators who oversee the mutual fund business and the lawyers who advise fund companies are battling about how far the SEC ought to go in regulating mutual fund advertisements.