Compliance

William F. Galvin, Massachusetts secretary of the commonwealth, has written a letter to Fidelity Chairman Edward C. Johnson III asking the firm to repurchase auction-rate securities that it sold to investors through its brokerage unit, Dow Jones reports.

The Securities and Exchange Commission announced Tuesday that it made its first of four payments to the 1.5 million Putnam Investments who were harmed by market timing, paying $40 million to 600,000 investors. In all, the distributions will total $150 million.

A number of brokerage firms that sold auction-rate securities, including Fidelity Investments, do not think they should be forced to buy back the instruments, much as the investment banks that created them have been doing, to the tune of $40 billion, The Wall Street Journal reports. Their thinking is that they were merely sellers of the ARS and didn’t have knowledge of their imminent demise, as the banks that ran the auctions did.

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is reportedly investigating Fidelity Investments and Charles Schwab over auction-rate securities, although it is unclear at this point over whether the probe is into sales or investment strategies.

Equity indexed annuities, which provide investors a portion of the market’s rise but do not decline in value when the market falls, have become increasingly popular among seniors.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has opened a website originally created for internal purposes at the Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations to fight anti-money laundering, for compliance officers at mutual funds.

In addition to helping employees save for retirement, a solid 401(k) plan can help companies to attract, motivate and retain good workers, enhance a company's corporate reputation and contribute to the long-term financial success of the business, according to a new study by Charles Schwab.

Ever since those first gatherings under a buttonwood tree, the business of Wall Street has been highly social, with personal contacts, access to information and networking abilities playing a crucial role.

As more investors begin to believe that the global economy is in a recession, fears of inflation are dropping, and money managers are turning their concerns from credit risk to leverage.

The Security and Exchange Commission’s 30-day rule temporarily banning short selling of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae stock is set to expire Tuesday night.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has opened a website originally created for internal purposes at the Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations to fight anti-money laundering, for compliance officers at mutual funds.

The Securities and Exchange Commission could mandate the use of eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) in mutual fund risk return summaries by as early as the first quarter of next year, according to industry experts, putting many fund companies on the data-tagging fast track.

A Florida-based law team is working to help investors of the failed Charles Schwab YieldPlus Fund recuperate some of their losses.

After years of waiting to be compensated for damages done to their investment holdings by market timers and late traders, Janus investors will finally receive $100 million worth of restitution.

After months of vacancies, Chairman Christopher Cox finally has a full slate of commissioners to work with at the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Many companies have moved millions of dollars of obligations for executive benefits into pension plans of regular worker to acquire greater tax breaks and pay for executives’ supplemental compensation and benefits, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Troy A. Paredes was sworn in Friday afternoon as the newest commissioner of the Securities and Exchange Commission by SEC Chairman Christopher Cox.

The Securities and Exchange Commission issued guidance last week for fund boards of directors in assessing their firm’s soft-dollar practices. The SEC said it was issuing the guidance a full two years after the limitations it put on soft dollars in 2006, restricting it only to research, due to rapidly evolving market and trading practices. True enough, there are wide discrepancies among brokerages today, due to rapidly evolving markets, trading practices and electronic crossing networks. Fund companies have until Oct. 1 to comment on the SEC’s guidance.

WASHINGTON — The Investment Company Institute last Monday urged the Securities and Exchange Commission to expand its proposed credit rating agency rules on structured products to include municipal securities, and to increase the secondary market disclosure requirements for the municipal market.

NEW YORK - A lot of people are wondering when the U.S. will adopt the same international standards for financial reporting that Europe and the rest of the world seem to be moving toward.