Wealth management

Forward Management LLC, an asset manager based in San Francisco, hired Jeffrey P. Cusack as president.

Fisher Investments, a Woodside, Calif., independent investment manager, has announced the purchase of Lighthouse Capital Management LP in Houston.

Transamerica Life Insurance Co. has announced the introduction of Transamerica Principium II, a variable annuity.

Working women are less likely than men to have adequate life insurance coverage, according to a study by MetLife Inc.

Many wealth managers are reluctant to recommend annuities to their clients, while providers try to disassociate themselves from the product's scandal-plagued past.

Fintegra Financial Solutions announced that it will make FundQuest's Institutional Spectrum platform available to its financial advisers.

Assets that were held in U.S.-based exchange-traded funds increased 0.5% in July, to $578 billion, according to a monthly report from State Street Global Advisors, a unit of State Street Corp.

BNY Mellon Wealth Management, a unit of Bank of New York Mellon Corp., has announced the hirings of Frank S. Levin and William S. Wyman as senior directors.

Envision Financial, a credit union in Langley, British Columbia, said that it has chosen Qtrade Financial Group as its new partner for comprehensive wealth management services.

Assets held in hedge funds grew 4.41% during the second quarter, to $2.973 trillion, according to data released Monday.

Wachovia Corp. will buy back more than $8.5 billion of auction-rate securities as part of an agreement to end investigations by state regulators into the marketing of the complex securities.

Jettisoning a big chunk of its health savings account business at the end of 2006 has produced dividends for First Horizon National Corp., the head of its HSA unit said.

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T. Rowe Price Savings Bank of Baltimore unveiled Smart Ladder CDs, which allow investors to invest equally in certificate of deposit accounts with one-, two-, three-, four-, and five-year initial terms.

U.S. exchange-traded fund assets fell 5.4%, to $575 billion, in the first half, according to a study.

Despite the credit crisis — or perhaps because of it — there has never been a better time to invest in fixed-income products, particularly triple-A commercial mortgage-backed securities, according to portfolio managers at Putnam Investments.

National Retirement Partners Inc. of San Juan Capistrano, Calif., has agreed to buy the advisories Winn Gingras Financial Group of Nashua, N.H., and MHK Group of Madison, Wis.