Investments

Equity funds net $582 million.

Last week’s stock market decline may be the low from which the market will rebound from, according to BlackRock’s Chief Equity Etrategist Bob Doll.

ProShares has launched an exchange-traded fund (ETF) that will provide investors inverse exposure to the high yield bond market‹a first for the market, the Bethesda, Md.-based ETF manager said in a statement today.

Direxion has launched three single-inverse fixed income exchange-traded funds to permit investors to wager on decreases in interest rates. They are the Total Bond Market Bear 1x Shares, the Daily 7-10 Year Treasury Bear 1x Shares and the Daily 20+ Year Treasury Bear 1x Shares ETFs. They seek 100% of the inverse of the daily performance of, respectively, the Barclays Capital U.S. Aggregate Bond Index, NYSE 7-10 Year Treasury Bond Index and NYSE 20-Year Plus Treasury Bond Index.

The Lansing, Mich.-based company just launched an online portfolio construction tool—aptly named the Portfolio Construction Tool—that helps advisers assemble portfolios customized to their clients.

The portfolios are broadly diversified and aim to reduce risk.

While corporations, consumers and governments are trying to get back on their feet following the global recession, continued volatility is pushing investors, especially high-net-worth investors, to pour their money into alternatives, which allow for broader diversification, said Gurinder Ahluwalia, president of Genworth Financial Wealth Management, at a media roundtable on diversification and new asset classes in New York City on Tuesday.

Charles Schwab has launched the Windhaven Portfolios, three broadly diversified separately managed accounts based on the assets and intellectual property of Windward Investment Management that Schwab acquired in November 2010.

Prudential Investments has launched two new real estate funds, the Prudential U.S. Real Estate and the Prudential International Real Estate funds, complementing the existing Prudential Global Real Estate and Prudential Real Assets funds.

Virtus Investment Partners has launched three new funds: the Virtus Allocator Premium AlphaSector, the Virtus Global Premium AlphaSector and the Virtus Global Commodities Stock funds.

The new offering will integrate absolute return funds that seek positive returns over a three-year period with less volatility than traditional asset classes.

Alternative investment funds which need to register with the Securities and Exchange Commission for the first time will find it a costly process, according to research firm Aite Group.

Risk managers appear to be warily optimistic about the U.S. economic recovery, the latest reading of the Risk Index from The Global Association of Risk Professionals shows.

While economic gauges and surveys have been showing an improvement in investor sentiment in recent months, lately, some of the numbers have been faltering.

The U.S. economy has hit its stride, with GDP on track to grow 3% over the next two years, according to a report from TD Economics.

The Conference Board Leading Economic Index increased 0.8% in February to 113.4 (2004=100), following a 0.1% increase in January and a 1.0% increase in December. The index is now at an all-time historical high and 16% higher than its most recent trough in March 2009.

Lincoln, who believes the U.S. economy is about midway through a projected five-year bull run, took some time this week with On Wall Street to provide his big-picture views on a number of timely topics as well as a look back at what financial services firms, advisors and investors have learned from the rollercoaster-like ride of the past few years.

The decision will lead to further litigation, as the claimants’ seek to reverse their responsibility for $400,000 in attorneys’ fees.

Nearly every day, I get a notice touting the launch of some new ETF. And at this point, most of them represent some fringe aspect of the investment world. Small-cap stocks from one certain country in the Middle East, say, or a fund from Africa that deals with water infrastructure. Sometimes, they are sliced so thinly that there are just a handful of companies in the underlying index. Useful perhaps, but probably only for a…

Global X Funds on Thursday launched the Global X S&P/TSX Venture 30 Canada ETF, an exchange-traded fund that targets companies on Canada’s junior exchange for emerging companies, the TSX Venture.