PRODUCT WATCH

Hockey great has a new goal: scoring with fund for athletes

State Street Research and Management Co. will launch a mutual fund for big-bucks professional athletes at the end of this month. Called the Athlete Fund, it targets athletes and “associated persons”: coaches, agents and relatives.

The fund, with a $100,000 initial minimum investment, will be a large-cap growth fund managed by Gardner Jackson. Former Boston Bruins hockey star Derek “Turk” Sanderson heads the Boston company’s sports-management group.

Fidelity launching 7 funds for Japan

Fidelity Investments plans to roll out seven mutual funds next month for direct sale to Japanese investors as the Boston-based company makes its first push into the Japanese market, which is deregulating April 1.

The new offerings are two Japanese equity funds; European, U.S., and global stock funds; a global balanced product; and a U.S. high-yield-bond fund.

Software targets investment lawyers

Merrill Corp., a New York technology firm unrelated to Merrill Lynch & Co., has rolled out a software program for investment company lawyers who need to produce legal and financial documents. Called Merrill TextManager, the software enables attorneys to create and revise prospectuses and financial reports.

The worldview from Dow Jones

Dow Jones & Co. has released its 1998 Guide to the Global Stock Market, an 850-page treatise on 2,942 companies in 30 countries, including 153 publicly traded Chinese companies.

The fifth annual edition of the guide includes profiles of every company in the Dow Jones global indexes. Chapters on each of 30 countries include key market and economic information and local market analysis. The guide is available for $29.95 by calling Dow Jones at (609) 520-7799 and through Internet bookseller www.amazon.com.

Smith Barney offers guide to Roth IRA

Salomon Smith Barney Holdings Inc. is making available brochures explaining the Roth IRA. Smith Barney has opened twice as many IRAs between January and March a
s it did in the same period a year ago. Dubbed “How The Roth IRA Really Works,” the brochure is expected to help reduce the “thousands of inquiries a day” the company gets, according to Ellen Breslow, director of IRA plan services.

Berger donating IRA fee to charity

The Berger Funds will donate the first year’s custodial fee on any Roth or traditional IRA opened with the Denver mutual fund company this year to Covenant House, a national nonprofit organization dedicated to helping runaway, abandoned and homeless children.

The annual custodial fee for Berger’s IRA accounts is $12.

Canadian tribes offer mutual funds

Hansberger Global Investors of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., will manage the first fund in the first family of mutual funds offered by Canadian aboriginal tribes.

The Aboriginal Global Fund, a value equity fund, is from Aboriginal Global Investment Management Ltd. of West Vancouver, British Columbia.

While the fund family will be available to non-native investors, subject to a negotiable 3% sales fee, sales and distribution will be targeted at investors living on reservations throughout Canada and the United States.

The investment management company was created when aboriginal leaders decided to pool assets and resources. The board of directors is made up of Canadian First National (a tribal coalition) business and tribal leaders from seven regions across Canada. Calvin Helin, a member of the Lax Kw’alaams community of the Tsimshian nation, is chairman of the fund company.

Great Pacific Management Co. Ltd. of Vancouver has a 25% stake in the company and is the exclusive distributor of the global fund.

Selling the secrets of long-term-care aces

Jesse Slome, a certified life underwriter and former marketing director of Transamerica Life Insurance and Annuity Co., says long-term-care insurance is a tough sell, but many salespeople aren’t making it any easier by the marketing techniques they use. He is publishing a quarterly newsletter outlining the secrets of the leading
salespeople. A one-year subscription costs $24, with bulk discounts available. A sample issue can be obtained for $5 by writing to Sales Creators, 4165 E. Thousand Oaks Blvd., Dept. 335, Westlake Village, Calif. 91362.

E-mail screening tool available nationally

Assentor, an automated e-mail message screening system designed for the financial services industry, is now available nationwide. Securities firms can use the system as a compliance tool to allow brokers to communicate with clients via e-mail while conforming to regulatory guidelines.

Securities and Exchange Commission regulations regarding e-mail messages call for a reasonable review of broker communications. Deploying Assentor enables a firm’s internal review operation to automatically flag communications that appear to be improper — such as illegal stock-hyping, high-pressure sales tactics and insider trading.

Over the past six months, four brokerages — CIBC Oppenheimer, Friedman Billings Ramsey & Co., PaineWebber Inc. and Scott & Stringfellow — have tested an early adopter version of Assentor, which is provided by SRA International Inc. of Fairfax, Va. The system has been refined based on the test results. Early purchasers include Advest Inc. of Hartford, Conn., and Ragen MacKenzie Inc. of Seattle.

Fifth Third welcomes Pinnacle to family

Fifth Third Investment Advisors of Cincinnati has added the Pinnacle Fund as its 14th Fountain Square mutual fund, with assets totalling $3.3 billion. The company’s parent, Fifth Third Bancorp, acquired the $22 million-asset fund along with Heartland Capital Management Inc. in a deal announced last November. Heartland will continue to manage the diversified equity fund, which received five stars from Morningstar Inc. for its three-year performance as of Dec. 31. It got three stars for its performance over both five and 10 years.

Training provider returns to Web

Securities Training Corp. of New York has relaunched a Web site at www.stcusa.com. The firm says visitors can search the more than 2,400 cla
sses it offers nationwide each year by course, location, date and time. They can also sample, online, one of the computer-based training programs designed to help prepare industry professionals for licensing exams. The program demonstration area offers sample questions from two Series 7 practice exams.

Other features include online course registration, a downloadable glossary of financial industry terms from the firm’s original site and selected articles from its continuing education publication, Compliance Digest.