Blog

Our experts frequently write blog posts about the findings of the research we are conducting.

Displaying 6 out of 6 results for "Welcome to Muni Markup Week on the SLCG Blog".

FINRA Investor Alert: Variable Annuities [Update]

(Sep 2009)

Variable Annuities: Beyond the Hard Sell

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) published an Investor Alert to help investors decide on how to invest for retirement. An annuity makes periodic payments to the holder of the annuity. There are fixed annuities that make fixed payments and variable annuities that make variable payments.

Annuities can carry costs and risks that many investors may not be aware of because brokers who are incentivized by commission-generation do...

FINRA Investor Alert: Leveraged and Inverse ETFs

(Aug 2009)

Leveraged and Inverse ETFs: Specialized Products with Extra Risks for Buy-and-Hold Investors

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) issued an Investor Alert to help investors understand the performance objectives of leveraged and inverse exchange-traded funds.

Exchange-Traded Funds is an investment fund that holds stocks, bonds, or commodities and typically tracks specific indices representing such asset classes. Introduced in 1993 by State Street Global Advisors, ETFs...

FINRA Investor Alert: Life Settlements

(Jul 2009)

Seniors Beware: What You Should Know About Life Settlements

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) published an Investor Alert on life settlement. Life settlement is the transaction that involves selling one's life insurance policy to a third party that did not issue the policy for a lump sum payment whose value is higher than the policy's cash surrender value but less than the net death benefit.

Because life settlement is targeted at senior people, the industry can be...

SLCG Research: Charles Schwab YieldPlus

(Jul 2009)

SLCG released today 'Charles Schwab YieldPlus Risk'

This paper reports on the Charles Schwab YieldPlus, a bond fund. YieldPlus returned -31.7% between June 2007 and June 2008. Though it told investors that it was an ultra short bond fund, it was in fact an ultra long bond fund. It held securities backed by illiquid long-term private label mortgages, violating concentration and liquidity limits stated in its prospectus. Up until 2007, these securities helped YieldPlus generate...

FINRA Investor Alert: Municipal Bonds

(Jun 2009)

Municipal Bonds-Staying on the Safe Side of the Street in Rough Times

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) published an Investor Alert on municipal bonds. This provides a thorough background on municipal bonds and advice on investing.

There are certain risks in investing in municipal bonds. For example, the municipality issuing the municipal bonds can default, leading to the loss of some (if not all) interest and principal to the investor. This is called default risk....

SLCG Research: Abuse of Structured Finance

(Jan 2009)

SLCG released today 'Regions Morgan Keegan: The Abuse of Structured Finance'.

Six Regions Morgan Keegan (RMK) bond funds lost $2 billion in 2007. In the paper, we argue that the loss was not due to 'flight to quality' or 'mortgage meltdown' but to RMK's portfolio concentration in subordinated tranches of asset-backed securities.

We also find that RMK misrepresented to investors and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in several ways. Firstly, RMK did not disclose to the SEC...

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