Wealth management

It sounds like a great deal: an investment that generates guaranteed, tax-free returns that are likely to be well above the inflation rate.

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Fidelity Investments said Roth individual retirement account conversions rose fourfold at the firm in 2010 as investors became better informed about minimizing their tax obligations in retirement — with some help from Fidelity financial advisers.

Whether they call it "aggressive recruiting" or poaching, financial services companies across the board are predicting the practice will intensify in the coming year, forcing many of them to sweeten their offers and actively seek out skilled professionals both within and outside the industry.

Despite the hype around Bill Gates' and Warren Buffett's Giving Pledge last year, the 50 biggest private donors in the U.S. gave less in 2010 than in any year since 2000.

The recession created a rift between wealthy couples on how they view personal finances as well as plan and discuss money, according to a survey by PNC Wealth Management, a unit of PNC Financial Services Group Inc.

Forward Management LLC has just introduced an alternative-strategy mutual fund, and the company's head predicts demand for such funds will help fuel a huge leap in the firm's assets.

Bank of America Corp., which lost a financial adviser with $5.9 billion in client assets to a rival in December, told some workers to sign agreements forcing them to go on reduced-pay "garden leave" if they plan to resign.

The purchase would boost the assets under management of its Bryn Mawr Trust unit's wealth-management division by about $1.1 billion.

Tighter regulation has been a major factor behind the success of Canadian asset managers, a survey says, which is a bullish sign for a U.S. industry about to go through a similar experience.

The sudden departure last week of Deborah McWhinney from her role as head of Citigroup's personal banking and wealth management unit raises many questions.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. will shut its Global Macro Proprietary Trading desk, a person with knowledge of the decision said.

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John Hancock Funds has announced an advertising campaign that showcases its investment management expertise and trusted brand.

Technology is changing some of the tenets of client recruitment in the wealth management industry, even when the targets are high-net-worth prospects with complex financial lives.

Once slow to switch financial service providers, ultrarich families have been replacing vendors that provide support services at a quick pace since the financial crisis.

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Deborah McWhinney, the head of Citigroup's flagging personal banking and wealth management group, is leaving her post after a tumultuous two-year run in which she attempted to makeover the nation's third-largest bank following the spin-off of its Smith Barney brokerage unit in 2009.

Charles Schwab Corp. has reported significant January increases in total client assets and new brokerage accounts, the latest in a string of positive developments for both the company and the financial services industry as a whole.