News

Advisors bent on serving the rich might consider taking an occasional look at the middle-class market. Consider this: Median net worth from 2001 to 2004 rose only 1.5 percent to $93,100, according to the Fed’s Survey of Consumer Finances...

retax earnings at Merrill Lynch’s global private client group (GPC) rose 27 percent in the first quarter ending March 31 to $646 million from $510 million in the same period a year ago. As might be expected, the division’s headcount...

Financial advisors have the best jobs after college professors and software engineers, according to a research report from Money magazine and Salary.com released today. Among the factors the report took into account were job growth, pay and stress...

Heirs retroactively cut stepmother's allowance using New York's new total return law. An appellate court gives its blessing

This may be remembered as the year advisors found out that even their wealthiest clients were worried about long-term health care costs.

The Swiss banking giant UBS added the retail unit of Midwestern gem Piper Jaffray today to its wirehouse brokerage division for $500 million in cash and other considerations.

Legg Mason announced today the renaming of a bulk of the Smith Barney funds as the Legg Mason Partners Funds in the wake of last year’s blockbuster deal. The move marks the first step in the product integration process under the Citigroup...

In what can be considered a coup of sorts for the firm, UBS hired a prominent black Smith Barney broker this past winter—while it was under fire from a lawsuit brought by former brokers alleging a pattern and practice of racial discrimination.

Lincoln Financial completed its $7.5 billion acquisition of Jefferson-Pilot on Monday, creating one of the largest life insurers in the U.S. The Philadelphia insurance broker/dealer paid $1.8 billion in cash, with rest of purchase price coming in...

For the first time in years, money market funds are looking like a good place for advisors to park client cash. With interest rates up to 4.75 percent—and with rates expected to continue upward—yields on money market funds are almost as high as...