Mutual funds

Brown Advisory has launched the Brown Advisory Tactical Bond Fund, a fund focused on total return that, using a quantitative modeling process to track macro movements in bond sectors, will invest in fixed income—including tax-exempt municipal bonds, corporate bonds, U.S. Treasury bonds, Treasury inflation protected securities and cash equivalents.

On the heels of the success of its Keeley Small Cap Dividend Value Fund, Keeley Asset Management has launched the Keeley Mid Cap Dividend Fund.

Touchstone Investments and Old Mutual Asset Management have entered into an agreement whereby Touchstone will acquire the U.S. mutual fund business of Old Mutual, bringing Touchstone’s assets to nearly $10 billion. The deal will also add several new sub-advisors to Touchstone’s roster of fund managers.

The TCW Group has launched the MetWest Unconstrained Bond Fund, a mutual fund with the flexibility to invest across a wide array of global fixed income sectors.

Putnam Investments has launched the Putnam Dynamic Risk Allocation Fund, a ’40 Act mutual fund that uses the “risk parity” approach of its successful Putnam Total Return portfolio for institutional investors, which has delivered average annual returns of 9% since inception five years ago.

Eaton Vance and Richard Bernstein Advisors have launched the Eaton Vance Richard Bernstein All Asset Strategy Fund, with Richard Bernstein, CEO and CIO of the eponymous firm serving as manager of the fund.

DoubleLine Funds Trust has launched the DoubleLine Low Duration Bond Fund.

HSBC Global Asset Management has launched the HSBC Frontier Markets Fund, whose aim is long-term capital appreciation by investing in companies located in or economically tied to frontier market countries. These include such nations as Argentina, Qatar Bangladesh, Kenya, Kazakhstan and Vietnam. The fund will track the Morgan Stanley Capital International Frontier Emerging Markets Index.

Loomis Sayles has launched the Loomis Sayles Senior Floating Rate and Fixed Income Fund, aimed at navigating changing economic cycles by taking a flexible approach to investing in bank loans and other credit instruments.

Chi-X Europe and Russell Indexes Monday introduced a series of stock indexes that they hope will be benchmarks for pan-European markets.

Mutual funds may have wielded the ax heavily on the people and technology to drive costs down, since the credit crisis erupted three years ago.

Looking for the Right Mix? These funds might do the trick.

Vanguard is changing the investment process for its four LifeStrategy series from a mix of active and passive management to an all-index approach.

Scout Investments has launched the Scout Unconstrained Bond Fund, which will invest across the entire fixed income universe—including investment grade, high-yield, governments, agencies, mortgage-backed, asset-backed and foreign markets.

State Street Global Advisors has launched three new exchange-traded funds, the SPDR S&P Aerospace & Defense ETF, SPDR S&P Health Care Services and SPDR A&P Software & Services funds.

ConvergEx Group has launched a new division dedicated to the formation, performance and management of alternative mutual funds.

Long-term mutual funds had inflows of $386 million for the week ended Sept. 21, the Investment Company Institute said.

Positive results from its “Who Knew” advertising campaign have prompted John Hancock Mutual Funds to extend the campaign through the end of the year—with ads on TV, online and in print.

Northern Trust has launched a new family of exchange-traded funds called FlexShares. The four funds, which are trading on the New York Stock Exchange, are based on indexes created and maintained by Morningstar and Markit.

Putnam Investments has developed a new website for financial advisers featuring sophisticated, open-architecture portfolio modeling tools (www.putnam.com/advisor). The site builds upon a series of practice management recommendations, links to Putnam’s social media sites, articles and videos of the company’s investment professionals discussing their investment outlook and the firm’s analytical tool FundVisualizer, which can model a portfolio from a universe of more than 11,000 mutual funds and ETFs.