Research articles from June 2002

Research archives from June 2002

Within and without. (Publisher's Letter).(brokers at wirehouse firms and independent broker/dealers)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... It used to be that brokers left wirehouse firms for independent broker/dealers to increase their payout. But the economics of producing in a wirehouse or IB/D environment are no longer dissimilar. A nearly 50 percent payout in a wirehouse...

Unwrapping the Market Wrap. (Naked Capitalism).(Market Wrap Unwrapped)
June 1, 2002... IT WAS INEVITABLE. After years of watching financial reporters become sex symbols to lonely traders, an Australian media company has decided it's time the anchors took it all off. Market Wrap Unwrapped, based in Sydney, promises subscribers...

Merrill fined for bad advice. (Shady Trading).(Merrill Lynch)
June 1, 2002... AS IF Merrill Lynch didn't have enough trouble, it now has to pay $192,000 for allowing a rep to sell an old woman Internet stocks. The National Association of Securities Dealers recently ruled against the embattled brokerage firm in the...

Hackers hit Fahnestock. (Computer Security).(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... SOMETIMES FOREIGN threats to the financial industry take insidious forms, as Fahnestock & Co. found out last month. A ring of computer hackers with reported ties to the Arab world claim to have broken into Fahnestock's database of client...

Desjardins shopping for brokerage. (On the Make).(Desjardins Group)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... HAVING CONQUERED Quebec, the Desjardins Group is looking to spend up to $500 million to expand its securities business. The diversified financial group, which got its start as a network of credit unions, says it wants to buy a "boutique...

The map of terror risk. (Rogue Nations).(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... THE GOVERNMENT wants investors to steer clear of nations that support terrorist activities, but how can you be sure you're keeping your clients away from the "axis of evil"? "Terrorism and proliferation are issues that merit investor...

Tokyo weathers bomb threat. (Global Markets).(Tokyo Stock Exchange)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... AN ANONYMOUS warning that terrorists were trying to blow up the Japanese trading floor failed to ruffle many feathers in Tokyo. Authorities evacuated the Tokyo Stock Exchange and the offices of giant brokerage Nomura Securities last month...

Wealthy investors lower their hopes. (How Clients Think).(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
June 1, 2002... AFFLUENT CLIENTS often demand superior results from financial advisors, but new figures indicate that they're willing to lower the bar when the market loses steam. The typical affluent American -- with $100,000 or more to invest -- now...

Bernstein Rescues Alliance. (Enron Fallout).(Alliance Capital's merger with Sanford Bernstein)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... WHEN ENRON was riding the top of the market, backing the stock was a source of pride for the fund managers at Alliance Capital, but now the wheel has turned. Florida's state pension fund has cut the firm out of its $105 billion portfolio,...

Tax-efficient investing where the tax burden of retirement is lightest and heaviest.(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... TAX-EFFICIENT INVESTING WHERE THE TAX BURDEN OF RETIREMENT IS LIGHTEST AND HEAVIEST RANK LIGHTEST TAXES HEAVIEST TAXES 1 Delaware Rhode Island 2 Hawaii Wisconsin 3 Wyoming Montana 4 ...

Lockwood takes IMAs on tour. (Town Meetings).(Lockwood Financial has organized seminars explaining individually managed accounts)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... IF YOU'VE BEEN looking for a way to get into the managed-account end of the industry, Lockwood Financial may have the answers. The firm has put together a seven-week, 35-city tour of seminars that explain how individually managed accounts,...

Catholic Fund charts course. (Church and Street).(Catholic Equity Fund)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... PROMISING TO uphold religious values and provide returns that track the S&P 500, a new mutual fund is looking to find a way to do well by doing good. The Catholic Equity Fund, managed by a consortium of sectarian fraternal societies and...

Patriot goes after fees. (New Kid in Town).(Pennsylvania's Patriot Bank combines itsy scattered investment, pension and brokerage activities under as Patriot Advisors)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... THE SIREN SONG of fee-based brokerage business has proved to be irresistible for Pennsylvania's Patriot Bank, which recently shuffled its units to get a bigger piece of the action. In an attempt to expand its fee-based activity, the bank...

Managed accounts on the rise. (Business Models).(investment advisors)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... CLIENTS KNOW what they like, and they're apparently becoming increasingly big fans of the managed-account style of doing business with investment advisors. According to the Money Management Institute, the number of separately managed...

Trading in rain and shine. (Weather Markets).(Weather Board of Trade files to become an independent exchange)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... TO PARAPHRASE Mark Twain, everybody talks about the weather, but nobody has found a way to make money off it -- at least, until recently. The U.S. weather market, once an obscure vehicle for energy companies and reinsurance firms looking to...

From the corporate shuffle. (Trading Desks).(multiple brief articles)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... MILWAUKEE-BASED financial group Ziegler is deepening its bench, adding two new faces to its management team. John Todd, formerly of Disciplined Investment Advisors, has been tapped to head up Ziegler's wealth management unit. He promises to...

Gruntal switches dance partners. (Mergers & Acquisitions).(Gruntal Financial to sell its brokerage business to Ryan, Beck & Co.)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... VENERABLE SECURITIES firm Gruntal Financial has abandoned plans to merge with Ladenburg Thalmann, and will instead sell its brokerage business to Ryan, Beck & Co. Although the prospect of a Gruntal-LadenbUrg merger originally intrigued...

Wade Cook takes a cruise. (Working Vacation).(Wade Cook Financial offers prospective clients a week-long working cruise to Alaska aboard a Norwegian Cruise Line ship)(Statistical Data Included)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... MARKET SEMINARS are not only a chance to land new clients, they've become an industry in themselves, and one Seattle firm has found that would-be investors are willing to mix business with pleasure. Wade Cook Financial came up with the...

E*Trade slashes rates. (Price War).(Statistical Data Included)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... AS TRADING activity remains flat and attempts to reinvent itself as a full-service financial company have stalled, E*Trade is cutting its fees. Starting in July, E*Trade will charge active traders $9.99 per trade, effectively giving its...

Finding the next big source. (Essential Reading).(financial advisor)(Paul Davis)(new financial research database, UNIVERZ)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... A SUCCESSFUL financial advisor has to know a lot about the market, and a little about everything else. But how do you separate the educational wheat from the chaff? During the development of his new financial research database, UNIVERZ,...

Doing your homework. (Q&A).(SubAdvisor LLC's Paul Davis)(Interview)
June 1, 2002... RESEARCH. For many financial advisors, it's not just the name of this magazine, it's the name of the game -- but for many others, the word evokes an eternal struggle with corporate reports and third-party analysis, a homework assignment that...

Broker bilks bud actor. (Whassup?).(former First Liberty Investment Group broker Joao Santos convicted of mail fraud and fired)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... THE SEC HAS charged a one-time Philadelphia broker with swindling four people, including the star of Budweiser's cult "whassup" ads, for close to $500,000. Joao Santos, who had worked for First Liberty Investment Group before being...

Rid yourself of fear now: financial advisors regularly trade additional income in order to nurse their fears of rejection or success. (Personal Coach).
June 1, 2002... THE FEARS THAT FORCE FINANCIAL advisors to underachieve and plateau come in many colors: the fear of rejection; the fear of embarrassment; the fear of failure; the fear of success; the fear of change; the fear of the future. Fear is so...

On the side of the angels: Steven P. Kanaly's NAPFA group sees itself answering to a higher call, eschewing all conflicts of interest. (Profiles in Success).(National Association of Personal Financial Advisors)
June 1, 2002... If consumers could nominate a guardian angel, surely Steven P. Kanaly would be in the running. As chairman of the National Association of Personal Financial Advisors, a select group of fee-only planners, Kanaly is a purist whose professional...

People person: RBC Dain Rauscher's new brokerage chief Peter Armenio puts the accent on building relationships. (Profiles in success).(RBC Dain Rauscher CEO Peter Armenio)
June 1, 2002... Up-front, straightforward but with a bent for whipping out funny one-liners, Peter Armenio is the quintessential people-person. Indeed, that trait came in handy as a financial consultant when he broke into the business 20 years ago. Now, as...

Creme de la creme: Doris Meister caters to Merrill's ultra-high-net-worth investors. (Profiles in Success).(Merrill Lynch's U.S. Private Client Group CEO Doris P. Meister)(Doris P. Meister)
June 1, 2002... It was, she says, a "hot thing" for new MBAs to do about 20 years ago: take a job with a big management consulting firm. But that would be the last time Doris P. Meister followed the crowd. From then on, the fast-rising executive opted for the...

The helpful wholesaler: making the most of your relationships with product providers. (Focus on Financial Planning).
June 1, 2002... Have you heard the one about the advisor whose punishment in the afterlife is to meet with mutual fund wholesalers -- one every half-hour -- for eternity? Or what about the fund representative, whose equally horrid fate was to hear the words...

Resilient rookies: today's most successful freshmen financial advisors are those who have employed creative marketing and forged strong mentor relationships.
June 1, 2002... There have probably been worse times in history to jump into the financial advice business, but today's rookies are hard pressed to think of any. Anybody joining the bullpen in the last four years got the worst of both worlds -- not enough...

Bittersweet Boom: layoffs and downsizing fuel retirement rollovers.(401(k) market)
June 1, 2002... Massive coast-to-coast job layoffs over the last two years clearly have meant traumatic times for many. But financial advisors are providing help -- if not solace -- to those unemployed folks by pinning down cash-flow needs and, perhaps even...

Multiple choices: advisors can choose from a much wider array of independent options than were available just a few years ago. (Cover Story).(independent broker/dealers)
June 1, 2002... With advisors seeking more and more control of their practices, the independent broker/dealers have begun to dramatically redesign the sector -- a move that could ripple across Wall Street. The changes are so significant that industry...

LPL Financial Services: LPL Financial Services is a leading financial services firm serving independent advisors. (Corporate Profile).
June 1, 2002... The firm supports the securities brokerage, asset management and insurance brokerage businesses of more than 4,000 independent registered representatives nationwide who have more than $40 billion of client assets. A registered securities...

The biggest problem in closing the sale: here are three ways to deal with procrastinating prospects. (Sales Seminar).
June 1, 2002... LOYAL READERS WILL RECALL that earlier in the year I offered a booklet of the "Best Closes" to anyone who would send me their own best close. The booklet will shortly be sent out (if it hasn't been already). I ask everyone who sent me a...

A "perfect" market: the IRA rollover market has got the dollars, mobility and growth potential needed to build a very successful advisory practice. (Sales Seminar).
June 1, 2002... YOU'VE PROBABLY HEARD THE term a "perfect storm" - a series of phenomena that come together and build on one another to create a once-in-a-lifetime event. Have you ever stopped to think about what criteria would make up the "perfect market?"...

Exchange Traded Funds: these funds that trade like stocks provide a cheap and easy way to reduce the risks of stock picking, diversify a portfolio and trade opportunistically. (Mutural Exclusives).
June 1, 2002... EXCHANGE TRADED FUNDS, or ETFs, have become an extremely popular way for investors to access specific market indexes for asset allocation purposes and for taking advantage of market opportunities. A sort of hybrid between regular open-end...

Enron's global fallout: failure to adopt uniform International Accounting Standards complicate the comparison of foreign companies with their U.S. peers. (Global Marketplace).
June 1, 2002... THE QUEST FOR UNIFIED accounting and reporting standards has gone on for quite some time. In fact, the International Accounting Standards Committee (IASC) was set up back in 1973. Even three decades ago there was a perceived need to develop a...

Global equity investing: depositary receipt (ADR & GDR) announcements & Corporate information updates. (The Bank of New York).(multiple brief articles)(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
June 1, 2002... South Africa African Gem Resources Ltd. DR information Ratio: 1 ADR=1 Ordinary Share Exchange: OTC Symbol: AFGEY CUSIP #: 008283103 AFGEM is a focused colored gemstone business, vertically integrated through...

Citibank depositary receipt issuers.(multiple brief articles)
June 1, 2002... EDP EDP (Electricidade de Portugal, S.A.) is the country's largest producer and distributor of electricity, with market shares of 64 percent and 99 percent respectively. Overall EDP, provides electricity to 5.4 million customers. In...

Giving consumers credit: a buying binge should lift the stocks of media, consumer goods and selected retail companies. (Industry Spotlight).
June 1, 2002... AMERICAN SHOPPERS PULLED OFF A MAJOR FEAT last year when they helped pull the country out of recession. This year, consumers could give another boost - this time to media, consumer goods and retail stocks, according to several research...

Actrade Financial Technologies, Ltd.
June 1, 2002... Investor Fact Sheet (NASDAQ: ACRT) Actrade Financial Technologies, Ltd. provides online payment technology solutions that automate financial processes and enhance B-to-B commerce relationships. The Company operates three principal business...

Deutsche Telekom: Deutsche Telekom is an agile, high-growth company with a proven track record of providing its customers with innovative services and technologies.
June 1, 2002... On the basis of its four-division growth strategy, Deutsche Telekom focuses exclusively on the fastest-growing segments of global telecommunications: * T-Mobile Global GSM-based wireless services * T-Online Consumer Internet...

Addressing the most important health issues of our time.(HollisEden Pharmaceuticals)
June 1, 2002... (Nasdaq: HEPH) What if there were a company developing potentially safe and cost-effective drugs that could "jump start" our immune systems to fight epidemic-level infectious diseases like HIV, hepatitis and malaria, or serve as a...

Lloyds TSB.(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... ONE OF THE WORLD'S MOST PROFITABLE BANKS Lloyds TSB is a UK-based premier global financial services company with operations across three continents. With over 80,000 employees, Lloyds TSB provides retail banking, wealth management, personal...

Questar.
June 1, 2002... QUESTAR'S value proposition is simple: natural gas demand in the western U.S. is set to grow by 30% over the next decade, and we are prepared to exploit this growth. Our integrated, Rockies-focused assets place us at the "hub of western energy...

DeVry Inc.(Brief Article)
June 1, 2002... NYSE:DV DeVey Inc., one of the largest publicly held, international, higher education companies in North America, is the holding company for DeVry University and Becker Conviser Professional Review. These operations provide rigorous...