Margarida Correia

Fifth Third Private Bank, a division of Cincinnati-based Fifth Third Bank, has hired wealth management executive Jeff Martin as its director of wealth planning. In the newly created position, Martin will lead a team that provides wealth-planning services for high-net-worth individuals and senior executives.

According to the latest statistics from the Investment Company Institute, an estimated $5.76 billion left domestic equity mutual funds the week ended Dec. 7, continuing a long streak of net investor redemptions. Since May 1, investors have been pulled nearly $135 billion from U.S. stock funds.

Equities and commodities are likely to perform better in 2012 than they did in 2011, according to Jack Malvey, chief global market strategist for BNY Mellon Asset Management.

Bank of the West has hired senior marketing executive Brian Katz to head up the Wealth Management Group’s newly created Banking and Sales Strategy unit.

Commodity and currency-based ETFs are gaining popularity as investors disappointed with poor returns on traditional investments like stocks and bonds look to diversify their holdings.

An estimated $9.2 billion flowed out of long-term mutual funds for the week ending Wednesday, Nov. 30, according to the latest statistics by the Investment Company Institute, a trade association for U.S. investment companies.

Mutual funds have a new competitor in the defined contribution market: collective investment trusts. These investments have been around for years but are now increasingly grabbing the attention of investors in defined contribution retirement plans.

BNY Mellon Wealth Management has appointed financial services veteran Ron Bruder managing director of a growing team of advisors to ultra high-net-worth families and family offices.

For the first time since the end of April, investors pulled more money out of exchange-traded funds and exchange-traded notes than they put in, resulting in a net outflow of $238 million for the month, according to the National Stock Exchange.

Assets of the nation’s exchange-traded funds rose 10.9% in October to slightly more than $1 trillion, according to the Investment Company Institute’s latest report on ETFs. That’s up $131.4 billion, or 14.2%, from a year ago.

But most of that money went back into bond funds and hybrid funds, which took in a combined $16.3 billion for the month.

A majority of Americans are concerned about the “financial protection” of their families, according to a new survey by Ipsos Public Affairs, a global market-research company. The survey was sponsored by New York Life Insurance Company, which launched an index this month called the Personal Protection Index to help Americans measure their level of financial protection.

FINRA has sanctioned eight firms and 10 individuals for selling interests in private placement offerings “without having a reasonable basis for recommending the securities,” the regulatory agency said in a statement. The sanctions included ordering more than $3.2 million in total restitution.

BNY Mellon Wealth Management has hired private banking veteran Susan Traver to head up its new office in downtown Washington, D.C., its first in the nation’s capital. The new office is part the wealth manager’s push to be in the top 10 U.S. wealth markets.

Wealth accumulation is taking a back seat to another important investor goal: having guaranteed retirement income.

The SEC has charged three investment advisors — OMNI Investment Advisors, Feltl & Company and Asset Advisors LLC — for failing to implement compliance procedures to prevent securities law violations. OMNI’s owner, Gary R. Beynon, was also charged.

Almost seven in 10 U.S. households that own traditional IRAs have developed strategies for managing income and assets in retirement, according to a study released last week by the Investment Company Institute.

BNY Mellon is opening a new wealth management office in Washington, D.C., the fourth-largest U.S. wealth market. The office is set to open later this month with staff expected to reach double-digits in 2012, said Larry Hughes, CEO of BNY Mellon Wealth Management.

Stocks and bonds are moving in the opposite direction more so than anytime in the last 10 years.

Gordian Wealth Advisors, a new wealth management firm that opened for business last week in San Francisco, has hired Sanctuary Wealth Services to provide infrastructure and institutional support.