Fund performance

U.S. News Media Group has created an online portal scoring 4,500 funds by integrating the rankings of Morningstar, Lipper, Zacks, TheStreet.com and Standard & Poor’s.

Investment managers around the world are cautiously optimistic about stocks in the coming year but more guarded about bonds, Towers Watson found in a survey of 98 managers with a total of $13.3 trillion of assets under management. They foresee economic growth, albeit modestly.

Average 401(k) balances ended 2009 at $64,200, rising 28% for the year and 5.7% in the fourth quarter, Fidelity reported Wednesday, citing the activity of its 11 million participants in more than 17,000 defined contribution plans.

To enable portfolio managers of its target-date funds to respond more nimbly to extreme market volatility, starting in April, AllianceBernstein will allow these funds to move up to 20% of their assets from equities and real estate investment trusts into bonds and cash.

The financial crisis has made a permanent impression on American consumers, who are likely to save 6% or more of their income over the next decade, translating to as much as $800 billion stashed away each year, according to a new study by Allianz Group.

UBS Wealth Management Americas reported net asset outflows of $11.2 billion in the fourth quarter as the division struggled to regain its footing in the competitive U.S. market. UBS blamed the outflows on advisers leaving the firm and taking clients with them as well as limited recruiting of experienced advisers.

Commodities, particularly precious metals funds, have been big sellers in recent months, but their good fortune reversed in January, when seven of the worst-performing mutual funds turned out to be concentrated on mining stocks.

An industry group developing best practices for 403(b) retirement plans is coming closer to streamlining these plans to make them even more similar to 401(k) plans, but first they will have to get everyone to agree to speak the same language.

Investors are about to test drive 401(k) plans with a 21st Century whole new look and feel.

NEW YORK - Financial experts think 2010 could provide many interesting opportunities in the realm of wealth transference, particularly with the temporary, one-year expiration of the federal estate tax and reduction of the gift tax.

With consumers pessimistic about the current state of the economy and the future, U.S. consumer confidence fell 32.4% in February from a month earlier, according to the RBC Consumer Attitudes and Spending by Household Index.

Investors are about to test drive 401(k) plans with a 21st Century whole new look and feel.

Defined benefit plans delivered an average return of 10.13% between 1995 and 2007, whereas 401(k) plans rose an average of 9.06% a year, according to a report released Wednesday by consulting firm Towers Watson. While that differential is just over one percentage point, the six largest DB plans analyzed outperformed the six smallest by three percentage points in that timeframe.

Based on the strong performance Putnam Investments’ funds delivered across a wide variety of asset types in 2008, the annual Lipper/Barron’s Fund Families Survey has selected Putnam as the No. 1 mutual fund family of 61 offerings.

NEW YORK -- Online retirement calculators are usually so confusing or overwhelming that the average plan participant logs in, checks their account balance and then logs off without making any changes. Putnam Investments has developed a new retirement income twist it hopes will resonate with investors, plan sponsors and financial advisers.

The Securities and Exchange Commission last Wednesday adopted several amendments to Rule 2a-7 governing money market funds that aim to reduce risks by increasing credit quality, improving liquidity, shortening maturity limits and requiring the disclosure of a fund’s “shadow” net asset value.

After the recent massive meltdown it’s no surprise that 81% of registered investment advisory firms and 79% of brokers/advisors believe that traditional asset allocation relying on stocks, bonds and cash provides insufficient portfolio diversification.

In 2009, mutual funds netted a total of $377 billion, with $357 billion, or 95% of that going to bond funds. Outflows from U.S. stock funds were $25.7 billion.

Hedge fund investors are more concerned with transparency and liquidity than they are with performance, SEI and Greenwich Associates said in a survey report, titled “The Era of the Investors” New Rules of Institutional Hedge Fund Investing.”

As it waits for the fee income that will come once interest rates rise, Bank of New York Mellon will continue to try and control costs and focus on expanding its asset management and asset servicing businesses overseas, the firm said during an earnings call last Wednesday.