Investment funds

Financial services, insurance, and real estate businesses’ hiring plans for the fourth quarter are the weakest they have been in 16 years, as a result of a contracting banking sector and the slumping housing market, a survey by Manpower found.

Although unemployment and inflation have been higher in the past 30 years, a majority of people age 60 or older have a very pessimistic outlook, according to a poll by the MetLife Mature Market Institute.

With Japanese households worth more than $14 trillion, and half of that in cash or postal accounts, Manulife Financial Corp. has decided to enter the nation’s mutual fund market.

Edward Jones will pay $7.5 million to California to settle claims that it failed to disclose its revenue-sharing policies to investors. Although it earlier denied the attorney general’s charges, in settling, the firm neither admitted to nor denied the allegations.

While American Funds and Vanguard raked in $74 billion apiece in 2007, Fidelity Investments netted $2 billion, according to Strategic Insight data. It was the first time in 20 years Fidelity didn’t rank in the top 25 fund houses in terms of net sales.

Anxious to do business in the world’s third-largest economy, where the population is aging, The Hartford is expanding into Germany.

Among the largest hedge funds, 35% are in the red so far this year, Hedge Fund Research data shows, as reported by The Wall Street Journal. As a group, their assets are down 4.3%, and among all of the listings in Hedge Fund Research’s Fund Weighted Composite Index benchmark, they are down 0.75%. This is the first half-yearly decline in the index since the group started it in 1990.

Bill Miller, manager of the Legg Mason Value Trust, may have made a poor gamble last summer, when he expanded his holdings of Freddie Mac, 14.6 million shares of which he first bought in the fourth quarter of last year, by an additional 30 million shares, The Baltimore Sun reports.

Julian Pick, co-manager of two Janus Group international mutual funds, is leaving at the end of the month, Rocky Mountain News reports.

The boomerang effect of the financial crisis and eye-popping oil prices are proving more difficult than even the most skilled mutual fund managers can handle, the Chicago Tribune reports.

Whereas financial advisers have long been known for avoiding index funds, and their newer, exchange-traded fund brethren, for fear of not appearing to warrant their fees for providing active advice, that is changing, The Wall Street Journal. Advisers are beginning to see the merits of ETFs’ low fees, tax efficiencies and narrow slices of the market—and instead of leaving it to mutual fund portfolio managers to create a basket of diversified funds, many advisers are now driving asset allocation themselves by creating a basket of ETFs.

The Pension Protection Act is proving to help people better prepare for retirement by easing employers’ liabilities for automatically enrolling workers in retirement savings plans. But millions of middle- or lower-income Americans are still underserved, particularly if they work for small employers that don’t offer a 401(k) plan, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Social Investment Forum Recruits Two PR Execs

Taking dead-aim at Middle America, Allstate Corp. has added guaranteed lifetime withdrawal benefits to its target funds.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) has widened its ongoing auction rate securities (ARS) probe with a sweep letter aimed primarily at sellers, rather than lead managers, of the illiquid instruments.

New York A.G. Probing Fidelity, Goldman Links

MINNEAPOLIS - Sen. John McCain is the better choice for the financial services industry not for what he would do as president, but rather for what he would refrain from doing, GOP lawmakers said here this week during the Republican National Convention.

An obscure book about mutual funds has begun to arouse the ire of the industry.

With the oncoming wave of Baby Boomers about to strain Social Security, Medicare, long-term care and families, mutual fund fees are going to continue to be in the crosshairs of class-action litigants, 401(k) plan sponsors, retail investors, regulators, legislators and even the courts.

AUSTIN, Texas - Making sure your company's 403(b) retirement plan is in compliance by Jan. 1, 2009 can be a daunting task, especially if you haven't gotten started yet.