Products March 16, 2007

BGI Launches Mortgage-Backed ETF

March 16, 2007 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - Barclays Global Investors (BGI) has announced that the iShares Lehman MBS Fixed-Rate Bond Fund has begun trading on the American Stock Exchange, extending the choices ETF investors have with fixed-income asset classes.
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The underlying index is market capitalization weighted and measures the performance of investment grade fixed-rate mortgage-backed pass-through securities of the Government National Mortgage Association (GNMA), Federal National Mortgage Association (FNMA), and Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (FHLMC).  

This expands the fixed income iShares family to a total of 15 funds.

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The underlying index includes securities issued by GNMA, FHLMC, and FNMA that have 30-, 20-, 15-year and balloon securities that have a remaining maturity of at least one year and have more than $250 million or more of outstanding face value. In addition, the securities must be denominated in U.S. dollars and must be fixed-rate and non-convertible. As of February 1, 2007, there were 387 issues included in the underlying index. The fund uses a representative sampling strategy in seeking to track the underlying index.

The new fund’s annual expense ratio is 0.25%.  

The iShares Funds are index funds that are bought and sold like common stocks on securities exchanges. The iShares Funds are attractive to many individual and institutional investors and financial intermediaries because of their relative low cost, tax efficiency and trading flexibility. Investors can purchase and sell shares through any brokerage firm, financial advisor, or online broker, and hold the funds in any type of brokerage account, according to a press release.

Benefits March 15, 2007

OSHA Targets High Injury Workplaces

March 15, 2007 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - The federal government's workplace safety agency has warned about 14,000 employers that their work site injury and illness rates are higher than average.
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A news release from the U.S.Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) said that the employer letters also offered help for the firms to better protect their employees.

“This identification process is meant to raise awareness that injuries and illnesses are high at these facilities,” said Assistant Secretary of Labor for OSHA Edwin G. Foulke, Jr. “Injuries and illnesses are costly to employers in both personal and financial terms. Our goal is to identify workplaces where injury and illness rates are high and to persuade employers to use resources at their disposal to address these hazards and reduce occupational injuries and illnesses.”

OSHA targeted the e stablishments with high workplace injury and illness rates through employer-reported data from a 2006 survey of 80,000 worksites (the survey collected data from calendar year 2005). The workplaces identified had 5.3 or more injuries or illnesses resulting in days away from work, restricted work activity, or job transfer (DART) for every 100 full-time workers. The national average during 2006 was 2.4 DART instances for every 100 workers.

The agency also provided copies of the employers’ injury and illness data, along with a list of the most frequently violated OSHA standards for their specific industry.

The letter also offered assistance in helping turn the numbers around by suggesting the use of free OSHA safety and health consultation services provided through the states, state workers’ compensation agencies, insurance carriers, or outside safety and health consultants, according to the news release.

The 14,000 sites are listed alphabetically, by state at: www.osha.gov/as/opa/foia/hot_13.html .

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