Investments

Thirty percent of mutual fund owners are willing to take substantial or above-average risk, ICI reports.

ING Investment Management Americas is launching a globally focused fixed-income fund that is expected to outperform market benchmarks by investing in debt securities for its institutional clients, the firm said Tuesday.

SunTrust Robinson Humphrey, the full-service corporate and investment banking arm of SunTrust Banks, has beefed up its institutional fixed-income team with the addition of six professionals, the firm said.

The State Street Investor Confidence Index reading of the outlook of institutional investors showed a four-point decline in September to 88, down from 92 in August. In North America, the drop was more pronounced; the confidence level fell 7.3 points to 87.9 from August’s reading of 95.2.

The Basel III bank capital requirements proposed earlier this month threaten to eviscerate the supply of eligible investments for tax-free money market funds — an industry already struggling with a severe supply shortage.

Vanguard Group plans to simplify its Target Retirement Funds and certain other funds-of-funds in an effort to improve the products’ international diversification.The Valley Forge, Pa., company plans to replace the funds' three underlying international portfolios with a single broad international stock index fund. Vanguard will also increase the overall international equity exposure of these funds.

Putnam Investments announced Monday it launched a suite of multi-cap equity funds.

Experts say that the new law could push annuities forward.

Vanguard lowered fees on its Nevada 529 as Fidelity adds bank deposit option to its 529 plans.

While municipal market professionals said they do not believe there is systemic risk in state and local government debt, there are underlying issues and credit challenges.

A number of Build America Bond issuers are seeking voluntary closing agreements with the Internal Revenue Service to settle accidental violations of a de minimis premium rule, an IRS official told industry officials in Manhattan yesterday.

Temenos said late Monday that it will acquire Odyssey Financial Technologies, a supplier of front- and middle-office software for private banking, wealth management and investment management.

The funds, which mark the latest enhancement to the Boston investment manager’s equity products, are designed to provide exposure to the full array of U.S. stocks within the value, core/blend and growth style universes.

Sophis said it established a partnership with a cluster, grid and cloud management software firm, to help investment managers disribute "resource-hungry" calculations such as risk simulations.

Most hedge fund categories saw fund outflows through the first seven months of this year, except corporate action and non-trend funds.

Vanguard Group plans to simplify its Target Retirement Funds and certain other funds-of-funds in an effort to improve the products’ international diversification.

Assets in exchange-traded funds have nearly tripled in the past five years, from $302 billion at the end of 2005 to $819 billion at the beginning of this month. Year-to-date 2010 through August, investors have pulled $29 billion from traditional US equity mutual funds, while ETFs have seen $40.8 billion in inflows. Since risk aversion is rampant at present, what is driving this tremendous and curious interest in ETFs? Can this momentum continue to catapult ETFs to a second big wave of growth?

Both remained in positive territory for the week ending Sept. 22, according to research firm Lipper FMI.

In its latest global outlook, Barclays Capital said there is little chance for a double-dip recession and the recent economic slowdown is typical four-to-six quarters into a recovery.

There’s a lot of debate right now about whether putting annuities in 401(k) plans is a good idea or not.