Investment funds

SalesPage Technologies and Coates Analytics have joined forces to offer mutual fund companies a customer relationship management tool with detailed information on distributors. The offering imports Coates data into a SalesPage portal.

Managers of hedge funds with $1 billion or more in assets under management will, for the most part, see their total compensation rise this year, even as predictions continue that as many as three-quarters of the hedge funds on the market will close their doors and many executives on Wall Street will be getting no bonuses this year at all.

Fred Alger Management has pledged to donate 1% of the management fees it collects on the Alger Green Fund to the non-profit 1% For the Planet group, which will, in turn, pass the money along to environmental organizations around the world.

Stressing that the reorganization is not motivated by the financial crisis but a strong desire to improve accountability and, with that, performance, Putnam Chief Executive Officer Robert Reynolds announced Monday that the firm is doing away with team-managed equity mutual funds. Instead, those funds will be run by single portfolio managers.

Upon laying off 1,300 people last week, Fidelity Investments indicated that another 1,700 will lose their jobs in the first quarter of 2009, bringing the tally of layoffs to 3,000, or 7% of the workforce.

As the Dow Jones Industrial Average hit a 5-1/2-year low, equity mutual funds lost $31.8 billion in the week ended Nov. 12, according to data from Trim Tabs Investment Research.

A year ago, there were about 200 mutual funds that had closed their doors to additional investments, but today, there are only about 40 such funds, according to Morningstar, The Baltimore Sun reports.

A record $156.5 billion was withdrawn from mutual funds in Europe, according to the Lipper FMI report. All asset classes suffered net withdrawals.

Bank of New York Mellon Division Hires Murphy

Principal, Diversified Management Resources

Testifying before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee last Thursday on the role of hedge funds in the credit crisis, five prominent hedge fund executives said they would be in favor of establishing a public exchange or clearinghouse for credit default swaps (CDS) to make the market more transparent.

Federal Reserve Delays Purchases of Money Funds' Short-Term Debt

LAS VEGAS - Lately, fund marketing and technology executives feel as if they have been bombarded with a barrage of data from their customer relationship management (CRM) systems, but their biggest challenge is finding quick, easy and cheap ways to access that data and make it relevant.

With investors moving so much money into cash and cash-equivalent instruments to avoid the continually downward spiraling stock market, it has never been more important in the history of modern investing for mutual fund companies to reach advisers and investors with forceful yet honest messages about the value of long-term investing and areas of the market that are safe, outpacing benchmarks or, perchance, even delivering positive returns.

LAS VEGAS - A recession may seem like an odd time for a renaissance in technology, but the need to cost-effectively share information and brainstorm for solutions has never been greater.

The Securities and Exchange Commission will not revisit 12b-1 fees by the end of the year, Andrew Donohue, director of the division of investment management, told Reuters.

The President’s Working Group on Financial Markets is looking at ways to better understand and regulate derivatives and credit default swaps, which essentially are insurance on corporate debt.

Assets in U.S. money market mutual funds rose by $21.28 billion in the week ended Nov. 12, for a total of $3.637 trillion, the Investment Company Institute said.

Testifying before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee onThursday on the role of hedge funds in the credit crisis, five prominent hedge fund executives said they would be in favor of establishing a public exchange or clearinghouse for credit default swaps (CDS)to make that market more transparent.

The fate of many a hedge fund relies on what investors decide to do with their money on Nov. 15, when it is possible an overwhelming majority could ask for their money back by the end of the year, Dow Jones reports.