COMPANY AGREES TO PAY $100M IN PROBE.(BUSINESS)

Byline: MICHAEL J. MARTINEZ Associated Press

NEW YORK -- Pilgrim Baxter & Associates will cooperate with authorities' investigations into the company's co-founders as part of a $100 million settlement in an improper mutual fund trading case, New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer's office said Monday.

The company was accused of allowing certain clients to market-time their mutual funds, despite policies to the contrary. Market-timing, a type of quick, in-and-out-trading, is not illegal but is prohibited by many funds because it tends to skim profits from long-term shareholders. Regulators say funds that allowed selective market-timing committed fraud. …