Wealth management

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Independent brokers such as Phillips and Robinson are feeling spied on, muzzled and flat-out disrespected as brokerages struggle to keep regulators happy and brands intact. That said, broker-dealers may be have a point; a clutch of them have been sued or fined into oblivion for selling products that were, at best, too risky for their buyers.

A decade of pushing to make disclosures by registered investment advisers more user-friendly may now be paying off, although, as with similar reforms in the past, investors will need to make time to read them.

What to do with a corporate pension can be one of the biggest financial decisions people make when they retire. For advisers like Mark Atherton, it is also one of the trickiest because no two situations are alike.

Despite the steady, upward trajectory of the stock market and declining unemployment figures in most states, middle-class Americans report they're less secure about their personal finances now than they've been more than two years, according to the results of a survey from First Command Financial Services.

Letting the numbers speak for themselves, Bank of America has sent a message to anyone still disgruntled over its $29.1 billion purchase of Merrill Lynch. And that message is: "I told you so."

Bank of America Corp.'s Merrill Lynch named John Thiel as the new head of U.S. Wealth Management, one of the top positions in the bank's Global Wealth & Investment Management group, according to an internal memo.

Carlyle Group, the buyout firm that on Wednesday unveiled another major investment in the banking sector, distributed more than $6.4 billion to investors in the first quarter.

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LPL Investment Holdings posted strong first-quarter earnings, as a larger fleet of advisers got investors back into investing.

New Era Financial Advisors Inc. had stuck with its broker-dealer for about a quarter-century, through a span that included a merger and the company's acquisition by a bigger organization.

Pacific Investment Management Co.'s plan to launch an actively managed version of its popular Total Return Fund, overseen by its founder, Bill Gross, may well turn the tide for actively managed exchange-traded funds.

Charles Kochel, a Jonesboro, Ark., adviser, spends two days every other week casting for fish — and for clients — on one or another of the 30 rivers surrounding the Arkansas River.

It isn't that unusual for a spouse to learn only after the fact that his or her mate (or ex-mate, if they're divorced) tried to cheat the IRS on a joint tax return.

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Bank of America Corp.'s Merrill Lynch investment bank unit said it has hired a Royal Bank of Scotland Group PLC executive as its chief financial officer.

Stifel Nicolaus & Co. has opened a private client office in Irvine, Calif., marking its latest addition as part of an aggressive expansion push into the western states.

ETFs are likely to grab a "significant" share of the 401(k) market in coming years, and TD Ameritrade Trust plans to be part of the equation, according to the company's president.

Last year was the worst year for bank-sold annuities in the past decade — yet banks' income from the products seems to have defied gravity, posting just a small decline.

Thomas Soviero unseated Ken Heebner as manager of the best-performing diversified U.S. stock fund over the past 10 years. His secret: Companies with poor credit.