Item: Forget grown-up boy bander Justin Timberlake. ING Direct is bringing sexy back (or trying to, anyway.)
Distribution is becoming a hotter topic in the fund industry as of late (see FA's front page) and industry consultants have not failed to notice this shift.
Item: The Securities and Exchange Commission's proposal to cap Rule 12b-1 fees is arousing some concern in the world of defined contribution plans, particularly among recordkeepers for small plans.
Item: It can get confusing on the consolidated audit trail, and that has the ICI more than a little bit worried.
Item: Calling all investors: You can now dial up your broker on your smartphone and invest in your smartphone!
Item: People who want to go on distributing mutual funds under the new rules shaping up in D.C. are looking at two things that don't fit well together.
Item: Pandora, like most other folk, loves a good birthday celebration. And, like most other folk, she doesn't often have the opportunity to honor friends who are over 100 years old.
Item: Sen. Scott Brown (D-Mass.) stood up big-time for mutual funds, persuading authors of the financial reform bill to obtain concessions from Democrats that define "systematically significant" firms by their market activities, rather than by assets.
Item: Once Scott Brown casts his vote on the financial regulatory reform bill in the next few days, will he fade from the thoughts of the mutual fund industry?
Given the current unemployment rate and recent state of the job market in the financial services industry, Pandora is moved to point out good job-hunting advice from time to time--mostly because the stupid things job candidates do make her chuckle.
So the Securities and Exchange Commission now wants the allocations in the actual name of target date funds.
Item: Pandora came across this startling statistic in her reporting recently: there are 75,000 Americans older than 100 and one-third of them still drive a car.
Item: Why has the President's Working Group on Financial Markets kept us in suspense for so long about what it has in mind for money market funds?
Item: Bill Gross' Investment Outlook for June is out and it's a good one--he even talks about "doo-doo" (deep doo-doo, to be more accurate).
Item: Vanguard Group last week posted on its Facebook page that a study found that men trade investment securities 45% more than women, resulting in reduced returns, and asked why there's a male-female disparity when it comes to trading.
Item: Pandora was thoroughly confused last week when she found out that former Major League Baseball umpire Dave Pallone is scheduled to deliver a speech on June 16 to Prudential employees about Philadelphia's National Football League team, the Eagles.
Item: Pandora's not sure the slaps on the wrist doled out to Securities and Exchange Commission employees guilty of accessing porn on their government computers at work was really an appropriate punishment.
Item: Women. Don't think you're getting rid of us anytime soon.
A peek inside the mutual fund world by our intrepid correspondent, Pandora.
Item: Who says white-collar criminals get special treatment?
Item: Like many who spend most of the working day in front of a computer screen, Pandora is known to check Facebook from time to time (don't want to miss out on all the fascinating status updates, after all).
Item: One theory kicking around Washington--and it may not be that farfetched--is that if health care is passed on reconciliation there will be so much partisan anger on Capitol Hill that this year nothing else at all will get through the Senate.
A peek inside the mutual fund world by our intrepid correspondent, Pandora
Item: As the U.S. government weighs its regulatory options, more and more of Wall Street's old guard is coming out in favor of stricter regulation of the financial industry, according to a New York Times article last week.
Item: Paul Volcker, the once-again influential member of President Obama's White House team, has a long memory.
"All you need is love." No one said it better than John Lennon.
Pandora must admit that the first thing she thinks of when she hears about the nasal-mist flu vaccine for H1N1, or swine flu, is not Calvert Investments.
Has Pandora mentioned recently how much she loves and anticipates Bill Gross' monthly investment outlook and how she is just never, ever disappointed?
Andrew Donohue's annual address last week at ICI's Securities Law Developments Conference was not exactly a big news-breaker.
Mutual funds have shown no sign of slowing down when it comes to sales.
Pandora is happy to report that the American dream is alive and well and that Americans remain as optimistic as ever.
Here's a riddle: What do registered investment advisors have to do with the homeless, pit bulls, child soldiers and famine?
Closed-end fund gurus Thomas J. Herzfeld Associates has published a nifty little book called "Closed-End FUN, 2010 Edition: A Not-So Serious Look at the Closed-End Fund Industry."
Friends and foes of a self-regulatory organization for advisors both went on a roller coaster ride of hope and fear as they listened to Barney Frank talk last week.
It's not too often, listening to the talk at SEC open meetings, when you wish whoever is in full spate would say still more.
Target-date funds could take a lesson in disclosure from this guy.