Mutual funds

Securities and Exchange Commissioner Troy Paredes told the Investment Company Institute’s Capital Markets Conference Thursday that as long as mutual fund fees are negotiated in “good faith” between an investment manager and a fund board, the Supreme Court or any other court should not interfere in the inner workings of mutual funds, MarketWatch reports.

Reserve Funds paid back an additional $1 billion of the once $63 billion Primary Fund to shareholders, leaving a remaining balance of $4.5 billion. The asset manager is holding $3.5 billion of that in a special reserve for legal and accounting fees.

Nearly half of U.S. companies are now automatically enrolling workers into 401(k) plans to encourage them to save for retirement, and an additional 33% are considering it, according to a survey by Watson Wyatt.

The Hartford Financial Services Group has created a new division called Hartford Life Distributors in which all sales and marketing for both investment and retirement products will be handled. This includes all strategic relationship management and business development for mutual fund, annuities, 401(k) plans and 529s.

Lord Abbett has decided to exit the bundled small plan 401(k) business, effective Oct. 1, to instead focus on the defined contribution investment only market. Hartford Financial Services Group will manage the transition of approximately 8,000 plans, 59,000 participants and $1.2 billion in assets, and will waive any potential costs associated with the transfer.

Vanguard is migrating a dozen of its bond index mutual funds to benchmarks that better reflect market liquidity. Observers say the move represents the government’s unprecedented intervention in the bond markets, and will likely lead other fund companies to follow suit.

With half of all exchange-traded funds falling short of the $50 million minimum profitability mark, attracting capital will be key to remaining competitive and potentially challenging mutual funds’ dominant market share, according to a report from Deloitte.

Wholesale changes are in store for both pension and 401(k) plans, according to a survey of 140 financial executives by Prudential Financial and CFO Research Services.

Morningstar has unveiled the latest version of its research platform for investment professionals. Now, Morningstar Direct users can create fully customized reports, presentations and fact sheets using Morningstar data.

The Securities and Exchange Commission is extending a requirement under the Treasury Department’s money fund guarantee program that will have the funds reveal their holdings and valuation each week through Sept. 12, 2010, if their net asset value falls below $0.9975.

Putnam Investments has unveiled the industry’s first absolute-return target-date funds, which will combine both conventional investing strategies with absolute-return methods that seek to mitigate market volatility.

T. Rowe Price’s new website gives financial intermediaries faster, easier access to more in-depth data and industry news, according to the company. The new site Troweprice.com/fi, which replaced the firm’s old site, features three main navigation sections: funds, adviser resources and news and updates.

Inflows to certain types of mutual funds reached the highest levels of the year in the week ended Sept. 17, The Wall Street Journal reports, potentially as a sign of renewed investor confidence.

So much for the recession impacting the American consumer for years to come. When it comes to their outlook on retirement, the majority of Americans, once again, are overly bullish on their expectations for quality of life, Allianz Global Investors found in a survey.

The Treasury Department has proposed several improvements for Section 529 college savings plans, including the use of age-based index funds and the elimination of home-state biases.

Kennedy Joins Lincoln as Head of Retirement Unit

Wirehouses are projected to lose $188 billion in client assets this year due to adviser migration, according to a new report from Cerulli Associates. And those losses are expected to continue over the longer term as well.

Labor Department Backs Off Proposed Retirement Advice Rule

LAKE BUENA VISTA, Florida - Mutual fund boards are grappling with their increasingly expanding roles as risk overseers, management coaches and shareholder advocates as the Securities and Exchange Commission continues to add new rules and raise its expectations, including the creation last week of the Division of Risk, Strategy and Financial Innovation.

Given the number of tactical and absolute-return mutual funds hitting the market, it appears that some fund complexes are now giving their portfolio managers more leeway. The 17 individual traders who run ProfitScore Capital Management's multi-manager long/short unified hedge account accomplish this by actively trading mutual funds within their individual specialty. They primarily buy funds from Rydex, ProFunds and Direxion, including funds that permit intraday trades. Money Management Executive recently spoke with John McClure, CEO of ProfitScore, about this unusual approach.