Schwabbies Back On for Fridays
From Wall Street Journal
Schwab has rethought its decision to ask employees to take up to three Friday's off. The decision was made after the firm realized that the request might not be legal. The paper quotes an internal memo as saying: "It's come to our attention that requiring employees to take Fridays off may raise some legal questions. With this in mind, we are not mandating that employees be absent from work tomorrow. If you want to come to work, please do so." It added that, "If you want to take vacation or use a floating holiday, you will be joining us in cutting costs, deferring expenses and taking other steps that will keep our financial performance strong."

Utility Fund Investors Get Nervous
From Wall Street Journal
Historically quiet switchboards at utility funds are being roiled by the energy crisis in California. The paper reports that some energy funds have lost more than 14 percent this year, an event shareholders are unused to seeing. Altogether there are 92 funds with some $30 billion in assets.

SSB Citi to Drop SSB
From InvestorForce.com
Numerous reports are that SSB Citi Asset Management is going to undergo a name change, The new moniker for the $400 billion unit: Citigroup Asset Management.

AEFA Funds Lose $1 billion
From InvestorForce.com
American Express Financial Advisors Funds saw its first year of net redemptions since 1988 as investors pulled $1.1 billion from its stock and bond funds during 2000. The unit claimed $112 billion in assets in the funds at year-end, down from $115.1 billion in 1999. One reason for the drop may be the AEFA's decision to offer non-proprietary funds.

The Euro Tech Fund Manager Shuffle
From Wall Street Journal
Investment managers of European tech funds are playing musical chairs, according to the paper. Aegon Asset Management's Stuart O'Gorman jumped to Henderson Investors in January, along with Paul Kleiser. Henderson itself lost three managers -- Brian Ashford-Russell, Timothy Woolley and David Magliocco -- to their Polar Capital Partners. M&G Group snagged Phil Pearson from UBS Asset Management. Societe Generale Asset Management's Chris Godding jumped the fence to hedge fund firm Moore Capital Management. His replacement, Hugh Grieves, came from Gartmore Investment Management.

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