Wealth management

The IRS should improve the timeliness of the private letter rulings it issues and reduce the number of rulings issued, a new government report recommended.

A wealth management firm has identified a growing niche serving clients in the U.S. and north of the border.

Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and Societe Generale have struck a settlement of pending litigation under which Lehman stands to recover at least $445 million.

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High-balance retirement plan participants aren't showing much loyalty to plan providers when rolling assets into an individual retirement account, and this could be a major opportunity for advisers.

Banks may be on pace for a record year in sales of life insurance, according to Kehrer-Limra's latest Bank Life Report.

Evercore Partners' deal to buy a 50% stake in the boutique bank G5 Advisors last week is just one example of how Wall Street dealmakers are scrambling to get a foothold in Brazil, whose rapidly growing economy promises to be an active source of mergers and acquisitions.

Barclays Wealth on Monday announced that it appointed banking veteran David Lewis as managing director and head of its Americas banking unit, a new position.

Looking to fill a growing need for advisers for its brokerage business at a reasonable cost, PNC Financial Services Group Inc. has been training promising candidates in-house, in a departure from standard bank practice.

Fewer hedge funds closed their doors in the second quarter, but there were also fewer hedge fund launches, as investors continued to shun startups and smaller firms in favor of large, established players.

Credit Suisse said it has agreed to pay $425 million for a minority interest in the New York hedge fund manager York Capital Management.

Cutwater Asset Management, a fixed-income money manager, has struck a strategic partnership with Tandem Global Partners.

At 91%, the overwhelming majority of retail investors support a fiduciary standard for all financial advisers, according to a survey of 1,319 investors by Infogroup/ORC.

Income in retirement is becoming an issue politicians on both sides of the aisle can't afford to ignore, according to a survey by Lake Research Partners and Public Opinion Strategies.

Industry participants say brokers have made a lot of progress toward meeting new cost-basis reporting requirements from the Internal Revenue Service, which take effect in January.

Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. is suing a handful of banks along with dozens of investment firms over so-called flip clauses that allowed investors to move ahead of the company to grab assets backing complex derivatives deals.

The U.S. investor Wilbur Ross said Wednesday that he continues to see opportunities in both Ireland and the U.K. banking systems, after bidding for the Irish EBS Building Society and investing in the U.K.'s Virgin Money.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. was sued by three former female employees who claim they faced discrimination in pay and fewer opportunities for promotion than men at the firm.

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E-Trade Financial Corp. announced Wednesday that average trading volume declined significantly in August. The New York company said that volume fell 36% from a year earlier and 4.6% from July.