WASHINGTON — The Investment Company Institute last week fought back against the life insurance industry’s attempt to get stable-value funds included as 401(k) default investment options.
NEW YORK — The Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards Inc. has adopted a revised version of its standards of professional conduct, placing a greater emphasis on the importance of fiduciary responsibility.
A retirement savings plan that covers more than 3.7 million federal workers may take a page from an increasing number of corporate 401(k) plan sponsors and institute automatic enrollment.
Faced with intense competition for financial advisers and growing transition costs, an increasing number of independent-contractor broker-dealers over the past year have boosted the amount of money they give to representatives and advisers to switch firms.
Bracing for change, registered representatives at A.G. Edwards & Sons Inc. last week met the news that they are being acquired by Wachovia Corp. with a range of opinions.
The recent setting aside of the broker-dealer exemption rule could make the brokerage community one of the hottest markets for exchange traded funds — a dramatic reversal from the way ETFs were viewed by brokers just a few years ago.
Edward C. “Ned” Johnson III has given the adviser services business at Fidelity Investments approval to loosen temporarily constraints on its profit margins in a bid to gain market share among advisers.
The son of former National Enquirer owner Generoso Pope Jr. is fighting his mother in a battle that has all of the makings of a story that the elder Mr. Pope might have splashed over the cover of his lurid supermarket tabloid.
Principles-based rules won’t be a panacea for financial services and, in fact, could create more regulatory risk, some industry observers say. The concept of flexible rules is being pushed hard by business interests and regulators as the way to improve and modernize regulation.
CHICAGO — Wall Street’s eagerness to develop and sell exotic new products to the nation’s growing ranks of retirees is worrying regulators.
