For anyone in a rush to snap up wealth management firms, or who thinks Wilmington Trust Corp. is poised for a buying spree, Ted T. Cecala says think again.

Fidelity Investments aims to double its assets under administration in the next five years, and stepped-up sales through banks will be a major contributor, company executives said.

While mergers and acquisitions among asset management companies were down significantly during the first half of 2009, many M&A experts predict this decline will flatten out or reverse by the end of the year, driven by renewed faith in the profitability of asset firms and banks' continued need to raise capital.

Hennessy Advisors has signed a definitive agreement to acquire the assets of two Japan funds with a combined $65 million in assets, the SPARX Japan Fund and the SPARX Japan Smaller Companies Fund.

As fund companies continue to look to streamline their operations to cut costs, even with the market recently rising, they will most likely merge additional funds, experts say. Some, particularly asset managers held by banks, will look to be sold.

State Street Corp. and Vanguard Group are reeling at the annoucement of BlackRock Global Investors, the $13.5 billion merger between BlackRock and Barclays's asset management arm.

BlackRock is reportedly the lead bidder for Barclays’ fund unit, and could pay more than $12 billion for the company, which has $1.5 trillion under management. BlackRock manages $2.81 trillion.

Federated Investments has acquired two mutual funds from Touchstone Advisors, the Touchstone Value Opportunities Fund and the Touchstone Diversified Small Cap Value Fund. Combined, the two funds have $233 million in assets. And they will be folded into the Federated Clover Value Fund and the Federated Clover Small Value Fund, respectively.

Broadridge Financial Solutions has acquired Access Data Corp. to expand its offerings to the mutual fund industry, specifically Access Data’s unique data aggregation and data management solutions. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

With assets so vastly depleted, many hedge funds are likely to merge, an asset management executive told a recent gathering of hedge fund executives at the SkyBridge Alternatives Conference.

Bank of America is selling a 5.8% stake worth about $7 billion in China Construction Bank to help raise a $34 billion capital gap found by the stress test, the Charlotte Observer reports. This amounts to roughly one-third of its current 17% stake in the Chinese lender.

UMB Fund Services, a subsidiary of UMB Financial Co., the listed, Missouri-based multi-bank holding company, added to its holdings JD Clark & Co., an alternative investment firm, in an all-cash deal.

An employee-led buyout of Neuberger Berman Group has been completed, creating what the firm calls “one of the world's biggest independent asset managers.” Neuberger, originally founded in 1939, has approximately $158 billion in assets under management. The New York-based firm is now majority owned by a group of employees, consisting of portfolio managers and senior professionals, with Lehman Brothers Holdings, the previous owner, still retaining the remainder.

Morningstar is acquiring the equity research and data business of Computerized Portfolio Management Services of Toronto for C$16.1 million. The companies expect to complete the sale in the second quarter.

UBS is reportedly considering selling its hedge fund unit to management, according to a Swiss newspaper, Neue Zuercher Zeitung, and analysts believe the unit, which has $39 billion in assets under management, could fetch $1 billion.

Private equity may not play a prominent role as it relates to buying up toxic assets, but sponsors are actively seeking the money-making operations of various banking institutions. The latest to dive into the fray was CVC Capital Partners, which acquired the iShares exchange-traded-funds business of Barclays Global Investors.

The first quarter was lackluster for financial services mergers and acquisitions, with only 37 deals, compared with 57 in the first quarter of 2008, Jefferies Putnam Lovell reported.

One shift in distribution strategy the financial crisis has caused, which fund sales directors should take note of, is that banks are looking far more attractive to a variety of advisers and more are hiring top talent.

As mutual fund assets continue to decline and investors migrate to low-cost products, fund companies are struggling to make management fees stretch even farther.

While most mutual fund companies struggled in 2008, John Hancock Funds finished the year in solid standing, buoyed by a strong first half and careful strategic planning. President and CEO Keith Hartstein recently spoke with Money Management Executive's John Morgan about the key areas that drove Hancock's record $8.5 billion in sales, some regulations he would like to see changed and his outlook for the rest of 2009 and beyond.