FundQuest launches retirement income platform

FundQuest Inc. of Boston has made its retirement income platform available to more than 2,000 financial advisers nationwide.
This new program is designed to help financial institutions establish a leadership position in the market for retirement income distribution advisory services.
The platform enables financial advisers to deliver advanced planning, implementation and monitoring services to help individual investors achieve sustainable income during retirement.

Fee Advisors Network offers policy analyzer
Fee Advisors Network in Troy, Mich., and financeXpert.com of Issaquah, Wash., have created the Universal Life Analyzer, the first of several module systems to analyze life insurance policies.
These tools are to be part of the network’s continuing development of a process for advisers interested in fiduciary standards for risk management insurance.
The ULA is designed to provide specific policy integration, calculate present-value dollar offset needed to equalize cost and capital inefficiencies between policies, and provide full disclosure and transparency
in analysis.

Rochdale introduces registered hedge fund
Rochdale Investment Management LLC of New York has launched the Rochdale Core Alternative Strategies Fund.
The fund, Rochdale’s first SEC-registered hedge fund offering, is an extension of the services the firm offers to high-net-worth clients.
It pursues a fund-of-funds strategy, broadly diversified by both manager and strategy, and seeks to deliver high absolute returns with low volatility.

Nationwide offers flexible fixed annuity
Nationwide Financial Services Inc. in Columbus, Ohio, now offers the Nationwide Trio Select+ Fixed Annuity.
A flexible fixed annuity, it lets owners make multiple deposits, provides a minimum guaranteed renewal rate and lets consumers select from guaranteed interest rate periods of one, three or five years.

Hancock introduces global mutual fund
John Hancock Financial Services Inc. of Boston has launched the John Hancock Global Opportunities Fund (JGPAX).
Subadvised by MFC Global Investment Management (U.S.) LLC, an institutional asset manager affiliated with John Hancock’s parent company, Manulife Financial Inc. of Toronto, the fund seeks long-term capital appreciation by investing its assets in U.S. and foreign equity securities of any size.

Options order router matches liquidities
On Point Executions LLC, an execution consulting firm in New York, has launched STING, its next-generation options order router and liquidity-matching engine for options markets.
STING is a smart-order router that executes orders by blasting all six regional options exchanges simultaneously to take all displayed liquidity at a given price.
By hitting all liquidity at the same time rather than sweeping the markets, STING is designed to achieve higher execution quality, because market maker algorithms respond to millisecond latencies in most sweeping algorithms.

Foundation provides ERISA online course
The International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans in Brookfield, Wis., has introduced ERISA, an e-learning course designed to provide learners with a thorough overview of the requirements of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act.
The course provides information related to ERISA, including enforcement, regulations and plan requirements. The course also examines fiduciary requirements, funding of plans and the types of plans covered under ERISA. The foundation is a non-profit educational association serving the employee benefits and compensation industry.

Placemark wholesalers can access Pyxis data
Pyxis Mobile Inc., a Waltham, Mass.-based wireless investment software provider, announced that Placemark Investments has selected Pyxis Mobile’s mWholesaler to connect its adviser sales teams to real-time enterprise data.
Boston-based Placemark provides custom investment solutions, working with managed-account sponsors to develop programs for financial advisers and their clients, while leveraging the sponsors’ existing operational infrastructure and preferred investment managers and products.
Pyxis Mobile’s mWholesaler enables Placemark Investments’ sales consultants to access remotely contact details from existing sales and customer relationship management systems, view internal sales reports and information, and add activity history, contacts, calls, meetings, etc. It provides wholesalers access to information from across the enterprise and complete administrative tasks on-site by integrating sales and CRM systems to a hand-held device.

Compliance tool adds fixed-income analysis
Financial Tracking Technologies LLC in Greenwich, Conn., has expanded its best-execution/transaction cost analysis compliance module to include fixed-income analysis by issuer, issue, coupon, maturity date, maturity bands, credit quality, sector, industry and price for municipal, corporate and agency securities.

South Carolina bank launches UMA program
First Citizens Securities Bancorp. in Columbia, S.C., is launching a unified managed account program. It will partner with Boston-based asset manager FundQuest Inc., which will provide UMA platform technology, overlay management and investment due diligence. 

Tool links advisers, third-party providers
BISYS Retirement Services of Dresher, Pa., has partnered with Pentegra Retirement Services of White Plains, N.Y., to offer the BISYS LinkInsight product to financial adviser channels. The relationship will leverage BISYS’ LinkInsight open-architecture service model. This model enables third-party administrators and financial advisers to work together to provide retirement plan solutions to plan sponsors and their participants.

Futures products track ISE sector indexes
The U.S. Futures Exchange of Chicago plans to launch on Sept. 14 its initial derivatives products based on select sector indexes from the International Securities Exchange Inc. of New York.
USFE’s first products in conjunction with the ISE include futures on the ISE Water Index, ISE Homebuilders Index, ISE Gold Index, ISE-Revere Natural Gas Index and the ISE SINdex, comprising alcohol, tobacco and gaming companies.
The futures exchange also will offer weekly binary options, each with nine or more strikes, so investors may take positions on the performance of single assets, including oil, gasoline, gold, silver and the euro. The contracts are valued at $1,000 and will provide independent trading opportunities for retail customers beginning Oct. 15.
USFE’s performance binary options allow for speculative trading on a single asset’s weekly price movement. Positions are taken based on perceived probability that the asset’s value will be a specific price or higher at expiration.

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