Commonwealth Offers Retirement Plans For Small Businesses

Commonwealth Financial Network has launched Commonwealth (K), a full-service group of retirement plan products for small business owners.

Commonwealth (K) products come with multi-managed fund lineups, competitive pricing and no front-end loads. The platform includes four plan types: an individual 401(k), an individual defined benefit plan, a micro 401(k) and a traditional 401(k).

Each plan type has no proprietary requirements and is available in both single and multi-fund platforms. Commonwealth representatives are able to choose from any fund family that is available through Commonwealth. In addition, the new suite of 401(k) products comes with a number of features, including daily valuations, 24-hour automated telephone access, live customer support, Web access for all parties involved, and administration.

Commonwealth, based in Waltham, Mass., partnered with Pension Administrators Inc. to create the platform. Commonwealth provides its representatives with assistance in enrollment procedures, plan design proposals and fund monitoring. Pension Administrators provides recordkeeping.

For more information on Commonwealth, visit www.commonwealth.com.

NewRiver Launches FundPOINT Desktop

NewRiver Inc. of Andover, Mass., is offering FundPOINT Desktop, a Web-based point-of-sale tool that gives financial advisors real-time access to the most compliant, fully auditable mutual fund processing rules sourced directly from the Security and Exchange Commission's EDGAR system.

FundPOINT Desktop provides mutual fund data and prospectuses through a Web-based tool that resides on advisors‚ desktops. For additional questions or to request a demo, please call 1-800-888-4646 or e-mail [email protected].

Bear, Stearns System For Advisors

Bear, Stearns & Co. Inc., based in New York, is offering a new investment performance measurement and reporting system to investment advisor clients at Bear Stearns Global Clearing Services.

Investment Scorecard Inc. of Nashville, Tenn., developed the proprietary technology, available through Bear Stearns' advisor workstation.

Visit www.bearstearns.com for more information about Bear Stearns & Co.

Standard & Poor's Bond Pricing Service

Standard & Poor's is offering a U.S. taxable securities pricing service.

The New York-based firm‚s new service offers independent pricing of approximately 1.3 million hard-to-price asset classes, including high-grade, high-yield, mortgage-backed and asset-backed securities. For more information, visit www.standardandpoors.com.

Morningstar Advisor Workstation Office Edition

Chicago-based Morningstar Inc. has introduced Advisor Workstation Office Edition, a Web-based office platform for independent financial advisors.

The system offers investment analysis, asset allocation and investment planning, portfolio construction, contact management and client reporting.

Financial advisors can register for a free 14-day trial, view an online demonstration, or find more

information at http://advisor.morningstar.com/productpages/intro.asp.

John Hancock Name Wins Out

Manulife Financial Corp. of Toronto plans to market virtually all financial protection and wealth management products currently offered by the firm in the United States under the John Hancock brand by early 2005.

Manulife recently bought Boston-based John Hancock Financial Services Inc., and plans to make the name changes because it wants to leverage Hancock‚s strong brand recognition in the United States. Effective June 1, Manulife College Savings changed its product‚s name to John Hancock Freedom 529.

NEXT And Moss Adams

Financial consulting firm Moss Adams LLP of Seattle will provide practice development and management support and services to registered representatives of Houston-based NEXT Financial Group.

"By partnering with Moss Adams, our representatives will be able to receive the highest level of practice-development consulting available on issues of critical importance to their respective practices," says Jeff Ault, NEXT president and CEO. NEXT was founded and is managed and owned by its registered representatives. The company has 500 financial professionals nationwide.