Mutual funds

Private equity firms are making it known that they, too, want to pull in retail investors' money just as much as do their hedge fund counterparts.

Attention! San Antonio, Texas-based USAA, the financial services company that caters to U.S. Armed Forces and State Department personnel and their families, wants to launch active exchange traded funds

The $8.7 billion Vanguard Capital Opportunity Fund (VHCOX) is now open to individual investors for the first time since 2004 and its $25,000 annual contribution limit for individual investors has been removed.

Total money market mutual fund assets increased by $2.61 billion to $2.631 trillion for the week ended Wednesday, April 3, according to the Investment Company Institute.

Westwood Holdings Group has launched three funds focused on global and emerging market equities: Westwood Emerging Markets Fund (WWEMX, WWEAX), Westwood Global Equity Fund (WWGEX) and Westwood Global Dividend Fund (WWGDX).

Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. has launched the BBH Global Core Select Fund (BBGNX and BBGRX), a successor to the BBH private investment partnership, BBH Global Funds, LLC – Global Core Select, which launched on April 2, 2012.

For the third consecutive week ended April 3, equity exchange-traded funds experienced net outflows, losing some $800 million, while their conventional mutual fund brethren took in $3.0 billion—for their thirteenth consecutive week of net inflows (bringing their year-to-date total to +$78.9 billion), according to data from Lipper.

Amazon.com is the type of stock that most growth managers have loved the past several years.

Curian Capital has added Gabriel Burstein as head of the Investment Strategy group.

Private-equity firms, the exclusive money managers overseeing $3 trillion worldwide for the wealthiest investors, are discovering a new type of client: ordinary people.

Franklin Templeton is the most recent fund manager to target the growing emerging markets bond fund category with the launch of the Templeton Emerging Markets Bond Fund.

MFS Investment Management has rolled out Class R5 shares for 40 of its US mutual funds. Class R5 shares allow MFS to offer a lower-cost share class option to plan sponsors of—and advisors working with—qualified retirement plans, including 401(k) plans. Class R5 shares, unlike many other share classes, do not pay sub-accounting fees.

Los Angeles-based Causeway Capital Management has named Foster Corwith and Alessandro Valentini as portfolio managers. Corwith and Valentini will join Causeway's six current fundamental portfolio managers in managing client portfolios on a team basis.

State Street Global Advisors has joined forces with GSO Capital Partners, the global credit business of The Blackstone Group, to launch the SPDR Blackstone / GSO Senior Loan ETF (SRLN).

Bill Gross’s Pimco Total Return Fund (PTTRX), the world’s largest mutual fund, attracted $32 million in investor deposits in March, the lowest amount since December 2011.

Nationwide Financial has beefed up its mutual fund portfolio by adding 17 new equity and bond funds from HighMark Capital Management worth some $3.6 billion in assets.

During the week ended March 27, investors steered an estimated $9.12 billion into mutual funds, down 26% from the $12.38 billion they poured into the funds a week earlier.

Investors pumped $9.12 billion into long-term mutual funds for the week ended Wednesday, March 27, according to the Investment Company Institute.

Leewood, KS-based Tortoise Capital Advisors has rolled out the Tortoise North American Energy Independence Fund (TNPTX, TNPCX), a mutual fund that invests primarily in equity securities of North American oil and gas production companies.

Fred Alger Management has launched the Alger Capital Appreciation Focus Strategy (ALGRX, ALGIX), which follows an investment strategy that concentrates the portfolio’s holdings to generally less than 50 securities.