Practice management

Wells Fargo & Company will offer a new mobile application for its brokers in 2012 to address a growing need for new advisor tools in digital media.

Previously, JP Morgan retirement sales reps were assigned to either mid- or large-market segments.

Former Morgan Stanley Smith Barney financial advisor Victor Manuel Rivera Jr. pled guilty in a New Jersey federal court to stealing more than $90,000 from the accounts of his clients.

The SEC filed a complaint this month accusing Brenda Eschbach of misappropriating over $3 million of her clients’ funds.

Regulators are stepping up their efforts to safeguard investors and their money from unscrupulous financial advisors. Here’s an interactive slide show detailing five advisors who have already found themselves in the SEC’s crosshairs this year.

HNW clients are price sensitive, but advisors have made their case as the economy comes out of the financial crisis.

NYSE Euronext said its annual report to the SEC that it incurred $85 million of legal, banking and other expenses in 2011 from its unsuccessful plan to merge with Deutsche Boerse.

David Ford, a financial advisor in Spooner, Wis., has joined independent broker-dealer Securities America.

Three-quarters of advisors at financial firms anticipate a continued rise in the number of peers making the leap to independence, according to a survey by Charles Schwab.

Ongoing efforts by regulators to give the public more details about financial advisors' backgrounds still haven't solved a key problem—getting more investors to use that information.

FSI needs a bit more time to respond, and some of the data requests seem misguided, according to a letter it sent to the Labor Department.

Bloomberg introduced what it called a “step change” in its core business, known as the Bloomberg Professional market data service.

The new design emphasizes simplicity. Bloomberg has cut the 30,000 functions available in its previous desktop product by about half.

Bock will lead the firm’s business consulting, relationship management and education teams.

While planners may know what different client segments they serve, too often they aren’t using that information to change their practices accordingly, says Matt Matrisian, director of practice management for Genworth Financial Wealth Management.

LPL Financial has appointed Joan Khoury, a former Merrill Lynch Wealth Management executive, to the role of managing director and chief marketing officer.

FINRA is seeking input regarding changes it is weighing with respect to BrokerCheck. The proposed changes prompted a swift and strong response from readers on Financial Planning’s discussion boards.

The new regulations follow a model that the North American Securities Administrators Association passed in December.

BATS Global Markets said the SEC's Division of Enforcement is looking at its methods for developing new order types as well as how it develops its information technology systems.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission voted to approve new rules governing, among other things, when swaps dealers can delay reporting on the size and price of their block trades.