The Markets April 3, 2009

Treasury Officials Give Money Market Intervention Five More Months

The U.S. Treasury Department has extended its intervention efforts to support money market funds for five more months, the agency announced.
Reported by

A news release said the extension of the Money Market Funds Guarantee Program (see “Treasury Opens Guarantee Program for Money Funds“) from its originally scheduled expiration of April 30 to September 18, 2009 was being carried out “in order to support ongoing stability in financial markets.”

As a result, according to the Treasury announcement, the program will continue to provide coverage to shareholders up to the amount held in participating money market funds as of the close of business on September 19, 2008.

Never miss a story — sign up for PLANADVISER newsletters to keep up on the latest retirement plan adviser news.

Officials said all money market funds that currently participate in the program and meet the extension requirements under the Guarantee Agreements are eligible to continue to participate in the program. Funds that are not currently participating in the program are not eligible to participate.

According to the announcement, funds are required to submit a program extension payment, an extension notice and an updated Annex A by April 13, 2009, and a Bring-Down Notice by May 11, 2009. The amount of the payment for the extension period will be based on a fund’s net asset value as of September 19, 2008, officials said.

For funds that had a market-based net asset value greater than or equal to 99.75% of their stable share price, the payment will be 0.015%, or 1.5 basis points, multiplied by the number of shares outstanding on September 19, 2008. For funds that had a market-based net asset value less than 99.75% of their stable share price but greater than or equal to 99.50% of their stable share price, the payment will be 0.023%, or 2.3 basis points, multiplied by the number of shares outstanding on September 19, 2008.

The department said the program extension payment amounts, when combined with prior payment amounts, equate to 4 or 6 basis points (on an annualized basis) of the fund’s asset base over the entire extended program term.

The program currently covers more than $3 trillion of combined fund assets, the Treasury Department said.

More information is available here.

In Practice April 2, 2009

PLANSPONSOR Announces Winners of 2009 Retirement Plan Adviser and Adviser Team of the Year

Steven Dimitriou, of Mayflower Advisors, LLC, in Boston, Massachusetts, has been named the 2009 PLANSPONSOR Retirement Plan Adviser of the Year, and Fiduciary Investment Advisors of Windsor, Connecticut, has been named the 2009 PLANSPONSOR Retirement Plan Adviser Team of the Year.
Reported by

The announcement was made Thursday night at the PLANSPONSOR and PLANADVISER 2009 Awards for Excellence dinner. Dimitriou and Fiduciary Investment Advisors were selected from more than 550 nominations. This was the fifth year for the award, which acknowledges the efforts of the nation’s best retirement plan advisers in helping make retirement security a reality for workers across the nation.

The other finalists for the 2009 individual Retirement Plan Adviser of the Year award were Claiborne “Chip” Morton, III, with Corporate Advisors Group in Destin, Florida; Mark Temple, O’Hanlon Michener & Douglas, an NRP member firm in Slingerlands, New York; Paul D’Aiutolo, UBS, in Rochester, New York ; and Philip Steele, Pension Architects, an NRP member firm in Malibu, California.

Want the latest retirement plan adviser news and insights? Sign up for PLANADVISER newsletters.

Other finalists for PLANSPONSOR’s Retirement Plan Adviser Team of the Year were The Kelliher Group at Morgan Stanley (Stephen Kelliher, Joseph McLaughlin, Bennett White) in Norwell, Massachusetts; Pensionmark Retirement Group (Troy Hammond, Laura Battle, Devyn Duex, Deanna Bamford, Mike Woods, Daren Alcantar, Denisse Hernandez) in Santa Barbara, California; SageView Advisory Group (Randall Long, Jon Upham) in Irvine, California; and the Kieckhefer Group, RBC Wealth Management (Rob Kieckhefer, Janet Ganong, Brian Kertscher, Darlene Roslawski, Meghan Madigan) in Milwaukee.

Nominations for the Retirement Plan Adviser and Adviser Team of the Year awards were solicited online from retirement plan advisers, their employers and/or broker/dealers, and plan sponsors, as well as from working partners of these advisers.

The judges panels for the awards included PLANSPONSOR Editor-in-Chief Nevin Adams; Steff Chalk, CEO of the Fiduciary Consulting Group; and Alison Cooke, Managing Editor of PLANADVISER, both of whom served on individual and team panels. Smith Barney’s John Mott, the inaugural winner of the award, and 2008 winner John Barry with JMB Wealth Management served as judges for the individual award.Stephen Wilt, now with CAPTRUST, the leader of the inaugural team winner in 2007; and Barbara Delaney, leader of the team winner in 2008, contributed their insights for the team judging.

«