Mutual funds

WASHINGTON-Few question the Federal Reserve Board's recent efforts to stabilize the economy, but plenty of people are wondering how much risk the central bank is taking.

Shareholders in a number of large Fidelity mutual funds, most notably the $73 billion Contrafund, succeeded in forcing a proxy vote at press time on whether the company should institute a "genocide-free" investment policy. Insiders did not expect, however, the unbinding measure to pass.

BOSTON-Asset managers will have to adapt their techniques and operations beyond their current business models to survive the shifting demands in the retirement product marketplace.

Although they may have lost their battle to get Fidelity Investments to drop mutual funds that are linked to genocide in Sudan, activists say they are emboldened that more than one out of four shareholders voted in favor of their proposal.

Charles Schwab is now offering a program fee rebate on its managed mutual fund portfolios, Schwab Managed Portfolios, to investors who put $25,000 or more of assets into a new or existing retirement account.

Rydex Investments is offering a new fund of funds that offers exposure to the alternatives marketplace to individual investors.

Spitzer Resigns After Prostitution Scandal

Two former designers of sports cars and fighter airplanes have formed the hedge fund Solytix Capital, which focuses on quantitative analytics.

Target-date funds are helping average investors get the same type of service wealthy clients have traditionally had when it comes time to transition a retirement plan from being aggressive to a more conservative plan.

Fund.com Appoints Webster as President

Contrary to popular belief, contrarian funds don't bet against the stock market. They bet against mainstream trends and look for undervalued areas with strong potential.

Cutting edge technology has facilitated the unified managed account (UMA) becoming ubiquitous within the wealth management industry. Today multiple investment products such as separate accounts, mutual funds and exchange-traded funds can all peacefully co-exist, nestled together under a single client registration.

These days the concept of sustainability is a hot ticket into the world of socially responsible investing. Just last week, a trio of investment management firms announced plans to incorporate the components of sustainability investing into their product offerings.

China's securities regulator has approved the creation of three new mutual funds in an effort to bolster the country's sagging stock markets, the Xinhua news agency reports.New Century was approved for a stock fund and Lion and Changsheng were approved for funds that can have a stock/bond mixture.China's benchmark index Shanghai composite closed at a seven-month low of 3,962.673 on Friday.

The Investment Company Institute said total money market mutual fund assets rose for the week ending March 12 by $6.46 billion to $3.454 trillion.Retail money market mutual fund assets rose by $5.55 billion to $1.246 trillion, taxable money market fund assets in the retail category rose by $3.17 billion to $951.36 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets rose by $2.37 billion to $294.66 billion.Institutional money market fund assets rose by $913 million to $2.208 trillion, taxable money market fund assets fell by $1.98 billion to $2.027 trillion, and tax-exempt fund assets rose by $2.89 billion to $180.99 billion.Money Fund Report, a service of iMoneyNet Inc., said the seven-day average yield on money market mutual funds fell from 2.78% on March 4 to 2.73% on March 11. The 30-day average yield fell from 2.96% to 2.88% during the same period.The seven-day compounded yield fell from 2.82% to 2.77%, while the 30-day compounded yield fell from 3.01% to 2.92%. The average maturity of portfolios held by money funds was 42 days, up from 41 days, Money Fund said.

The mutual fund industry in Mexico is poised for growth in the coming years as average household incomes increase and Mexican investors change their savings habits, according to Business News Americas.

Chinese mutual funds posted moderate gains in February after declining more than seven percent in January, according to a recent report.

New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, the former New York State attorney general who was instrumental in waging war against Wall Street corruption and the mutual fund industry’s after-hours trading and market-timing activities, publicly apologized Monday afternoon to his family and the public for unspecified behavior, but stopped short of resigning his position as governor.

Innovation is the name of the game for Keith Geary, CEO, president and chairman of Capital West Securities, a small, 13-year-old Oklahoma City-based broker/dealer. The firm recently registered its new investment advisory arm OOK Advisors and last week filed to offer the Capital West Oklahoma Index Fund, the first ETF to invest exclusively in publicly-traded companies headquartered in Oklahoma. The ETF is expected to begin trading on the American Stock Exchange in April.

Fidelity VP Investigated for Entertainment Methods