Fund performance

Global equities are benefiting from an increasingly positive outlook by investors, according to the latest BoA Merrill Lynch Survey of Fund Managers.

U.S. banks have finally started extending loans to consumers for the first time since the credit crisis began in 2008.

The Conference Board Leading Economic Index for the U.S. rose 1% in December to 112.4, following a 1.1% gain in November and a 0.4% rise in October.

For all those bears out there it’s time to turn those frowns upside down.

With stocks up for the seventh consecutive week, Bob Doll, BlackRock chief equity strategist, sees no reason to expect a plunge.

Global equities are benefiting from an increasingly positive outlook by investors, according to the latest BoA Merrill Lynch Survey of Fund Managers.Just over half of fund managers, 55%, say they’re overweight in global equities, the largest proportion since July 2007. Just last month, only 40% of fund managers said they were overweight in international stocks. The additional assets appear to have come from bonds—54% of fund managers are now underweight in bonds, from 47% in December.

The Charles Schwab Corporation announced on Tuesday that fourth quarter revenues soared 14% year-over-year and December net new assets grew to more than $11 billion, the highest level in 23 months.

For equity funds, 2010 was a solid year, with the average fund rising 16.57% and 98% of all equity funds in positive territory, according to Lipper. Sector equity funds rose 19.02%, U.S. domestic equity funds rose 17.14%, world equity funds were up 13.67% and mixed asset funds delivered 12.02%.

It may turn out to be a glass-half-full kind of year, after all.

The Conference Board Measure of CEO Confidence rallied to 62 in the fourth quarter, up from 50 in the third quarter.

NEW YORK-The U.S. economy will muddle through even as domestic stocks rake in double-digit percentage returns for the third straight year, said Robert C. Doll, the chief equity strategist for fundamental equities at BlackRock, in a breakfast briefing in New York Tuesday.

Equity funds delivered 16.57% in 2010, with more than one-third of the gains, 6.43%, coming in during the last five weeks of the year, Lipper said.

Managing risk with be the trend in the investment management business in 2011, said Ed Keon, managing director and portfolio manager for Prudential Financial's Quantitative Management Associates, at Prudential’s 2011 Global Economic and Retirement Outlook briefing in New York on Tuesday.

The Dow Jones Economic Sentiment Indicator jumped 2.2 points to 46.1 in December, after holding steady at 43.9 in October and November. In December 2009, the indicator stood at 38.7.

The U.S. economy will muddle through 2011 even as domestic stocks rake in double-digit percentage returns for the third straight year, said Robert C. Doll, the chief equity strategist for fundamental equities at BlackRock, in a breakfast briefing in New York Tuesday.

The economic rebound in 2011 will be slow but steady—but not strong enough to prompt employers to begin hiring again, according to the findings of the latest Turnaround Management Association survey.

The outlook for the U.S. economy in 2011 appears to be ... slow and unsteady as she goes.

After three years of cautious spending and paying down debt, American households have significantly improved their balance sheets. Yet consumer confidence slipped this month as more people worried about the job outlook.

Although Bank of America Merrill Lynch forecasts modest global growth in 2011, it does predict that stock prices around the world will rise by more than 15% and that the S&P 500 will rise by 9%.

Spectrem Group announced Wednesday that its Spectrem Millionaire Investor Confidence Index rose seven points in December to end the year at 7.