Practice management

Four bank failures book-ended the country on Friday. Collectively, they had a total of $1.05 billion in assets and are expected to cost the Deposit Insurance Fund $267.6 million.

Of the 75 technology companies represented at the T3 Conference, Smarsh and Arkovi are among the companies offering tools to help advisors be active in the space.

Succession planning in a financial advisory firm is vital to long- term success and growth, according to Richard C. Salmen, a certified financial planner and senior vice president and senior advisor of GTrust Financial Partners in Overland Park, Kan.

Some advisors at Bank of America Merrill Lynch's U.S. Trust unit this week received an ultimatum from on high, demanding they sign a new agreement that would effectively sideline them for up to eight months if and when they decide to leave the firm or else risk losing not only their 2010 bonuses but their jobs, too.

The regulator said the companies had failed to adequately safeguard non-public customer information.

James Shorris is set to return to the private sector in April after more than seven years in enforcement leadership roles at the organization.

Whose needs come first?

“What worked 5 years ago, doesn’t work today,” Peter Montoya told a packed room at Thursday’s T3 conference in Florida.

Marie Swift, the president and CEO of Impact Communications, presented to a room of advisors at the T3 Conference in Florida on how they can maximize their online presence by effectively using social media.

When it comes to web marketing, independent advisors are different from everyone else. Which means there is a good chance you have been getting bad advice. Bad advice about using the web to grow your practice.

Baird has added one advisor to its Charlotte, N.C., office, and three to its Charleston, S.C., office. All four come from Morgan Stanley Smith Barney.

FSC Securities Corp., based in Atlanta has already picked up more than 50 of QA3's old reps.

The app, which can be downloaded for free from Apple's App Store, is the firm's first foray into the mobile applications arena and the cornerstone of its nascent WealthCentral Mobile strategy.

Senate Banking Committee members raised a host of concerns Thursday about the state of the financial services industry as regulators grapple with a mountain of new rules mandated by the Dodd-Frank Act.

There's a lot of passion among advisors who, I think, suspect that there will eventually be standards that don't include them.

The two marriage partners did not describe this as a ‘merger of equals.’ Deutche Borse shareholders, after all, will have 60% control. But NYSE Euronext chief executive Duncan Niederauer says it’s not a takeover. So what is it?

Senate Banking Committee Republicans worry Securities and Exchange Commission chairman Mary Schapiro and other regulators are rushing to implement rules mandated by the Dodd-Frank Act without sufficient regard to cost-benefit analyses or public comments.

There's a post-retirement crisis coming. But research indicates that the very individuals that most need guaranteed income in their lives are most resistant, according to Shlomo Benartzi, an expert in how human behavior affects the financing of human lives.

"Social media" is not just some amorphous glob of communications outlets to be employed or avoided. Here's the quick setup to get going with a strategy to use social technologies effectively.

Joseph Price, FINRA senior vice president of corporate financing and advertising regulation, told Dow Jones a second Social Networking Task Force will meet in March and more guidance will be issued by the end of the year.