Investments

The Conference Board Leading Economic Index rose 0.1% in January to 112.3, following a 0.8% rise in December and a 1.1% increase in November.

Global X Funds has launched the Global X FTSE ASEAN 40 ETF, which targets the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, comprised of Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines. The fund tracks the FTSE/ASEAN 40 Index.

Fund managers are the most bullish they have been on global equities they have been in a decade, with 67% overweight the asset class, according to the February BoA Merrill Lynch Survey of Fund Managers, which surveyed 188 fund managers with total assets of $569 billion under management. This is up from 55% in January and 40% in December.

The platform, which offers products from Axa, Allianz, Lincoln Financial, Prudential and Sun Life, enables discretionary management of variable annuity assets.

Annuities sold through banks hit a rough patch last year, but 2011 looks brighter as interest rates begin to rise and the Dow Jones Industrial Average continues to improve.

UMB Healthcare Services announced it has seen a significant increase in the number of health spending accounts and expects even more in 2011.

Let's get straight to the point: If you think your 17-year-old daughter is taking plastic sandwich bags out of kitchen cabinet to hide a cocaine habit, you're wrong.

The Obama administration’s proposal to renew the Build America Bond program may suffer from the same problem it had the first time around, when the federal government didn’t think municipalities would use BABs that much.

Just one day after the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board issued a draft rule on muni advisors’ fiduciary duties, market participants are questioning the scope of the rule and whether it would apply to dealer-advisers.

MIAMI -- There is of course no event going on in America from January 14 through 16 than the 29th annual National Investment Company Service Association Conference & Expo.

It used to be that a mutual fund was a pretty easy product to launch. Line up a set up securities. Buy. Hold. Mix occasionally. Now, managing products such as target-date funds present serious operational challenges, the CEO of J.P. Morgan Asset Management Americas said

The Country Financial Security Index rose 0.8 points to 64.9 in February, marking the first time the index has risen at the start of the year since Country Financial began the index in 2007.

MIAMI: The forecasting firms are fairly unified about their expectations for information technology spending by financial services firms in 2011.

American Beacon Advisors has launched the American Beacon SiM High Yield Opportunities Fund, sub-advised by Strategic Income Management (SiM).

ING Group, the Dutch-based financial services institution, said today that it has decided to sell the “majority” of its ING Real Estate Investment Management businesses in two separate transactions worth more than $1 billion.

The “Who Knew” campaign showcases the firm’s four- and five-star-rated funds.

The $3.7 trillion fiscal 2012 budget proposed by President Obama Monday would permanently reinstate an expanded Build America Bond program but at a lower 28% subsidy rate.

The date was October 13, 2008. One month after Lehman Brothers was left to twist quickly in the wind and die.

Asian hedge funds attracted $518 million in net new capital in the final three months of last year, according to Hedge Fund Research, Inc., making it the best quarter of the year for the industry.

The enhanced system will provide more than 30 data points on each bond, with performance information going back 10 years.