Federated back in for more money funds

The regulatory storm clouds hanging over money-market funds doesn't seem to be cowing Federated Investors Inc. The Pittsburgh-based firm, which manages almost 10% of all money-market fund assets, announced on Wednesday it was acquiring an additional $571 million of money-market fund assets from Trustmark Investment Advisors, Inc, a subsidiary of Trustmark National Bank. It's the second such deal in recent months for Federated. The company picked up $5 billion in money-market funds from Fifth Third Bancorp in April. Christopher Donahue, president and CEO of Federated, said in an interview at the time of the Fifth Third Deal that the company's management was looking to benefit from banks being “more open” to selling their money-market funds thanks to the regulatory uncertainty. In addition to the money-market fund assets, Federated will also acquire four equity and two fixed-income mutual funds with a total of $332 million in assets.