On APril 17, 2012, Franklin Templeton Investments Corp. has proposed merging the Wellington West Franklin Templeton Balanced Retirement Income Fund into Quotential Balanced Growth Portfolio.

On April 14, Touchstone finalized its deal with Old Mutual.

On April 16, 2012, Federated Investors, Inc. has completed its purchase of the London-based liquidity and fixed-income product manager Prime Rate Capital Management.

Some firms grow organically, pumping out funds. Then, they hire reps and distributors to market and sell their offerings.

It’s almost a done deal.

It's official: BlackRock, Inc. today says it has completed its acquisition of the Toronto-based Claymore Investments, Inc.

361 Capital, a provider of alternative investment mutual funds, separate accounts, and limited partnerships to institutions, financial intermediaries, and high-net-worth investors, has entered into a strategic partnership with Lighthouse Partners, a fund-of-hedge-funds and managed account investment adviser.

Financial exchange operator TMX Group announced that its friendly offer to buy over 90% of the shares of Sydney-based Razor Risk Technologies Ltd. was accepted.

With a projected valuation of as much as $100 billion, Facebook’s imminent IPO may portend great things for social media. But many planners feel less bullish about its prospects for delivering investment returns.

Antitrust regulators in Europe stopped the merger of Deutsche Boerse and NYSE Euronext on Wednesday, saying the combined group would have a stranglehold on the listed European futures market and would thwart new entrants.

NYSE Euronext said it would focus on its “standalone strategy,’’ while Deutsche Boerse declared this a ‘black day’ after the European Commission prohibited the merger of the two exchange operators.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has joined the U.S. Department of Justice in approving the merger of NYSE Euronext with Deutsche Boerse.

Morgan Keegan's brokerage force has stayed in wait-and-see mode as parent firm Regions Financial looks to sell that business, but that could all change if uncertainty about the firm's future persists or if a new deal presents unfavorable terms, experts say.

Deutsche Boerse and NYSE Euronext have decided to push back the deadline for completing their merger until March 31.

Federated Investors has reached an agreement to acquire Prime Rate Capital Management of London, a specialist in cash management and fixed income products. The company also has a family of UCITS, including the Prime Rate Sterling Liquidity Fund, Prime Rate Euro Liquidity Fund and Prime Rate U.S. Dollar Liquidity Fund.

With approval from the U.S. Justice Department in hand and approval from the European Commission still to be achieved, NYSE Euronext is looking for a period of relative quiet through the end of the year on its quest to merge with Deutsche Boerse.

The merger of NYSE Euronext and Deutsche Boerse has been cleared on the New York side of the Atlantic Ocean.

Deutsche Boerse and NYSE Euronext have offered to cap fees on trading in their European derivatives contracts for three years in their last-ditch effort to get their $9 billion merger cleared by the European Union.

inShareWells Fargo & Co. has signed a deal to acquire investment boutique EverKey Global Partners.

Goldman Sachs' asset management division has agreed to purchase the mutual fund division of Dividend Growth Advisors, in a push to offer more income-generating funds.