Deals & People March 15, 2010

Black Diamond Brings on Fidelity Executive

Karen Lisowski has joined Black Diamond Performance Reporting as vice president of sales.
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In this position, Lisowski will oversee client relationships and business development for the Western part of the U.S for Black Diamond, a provider of an outsourced investment performance reporting tool for advisors and wealth managers. She will be based in the San Francisco Bay Area and will focus on developing relationships with independent financial advisers and wealth managers in the Western part of the U.S.

Most recently, Lisowski was a VP of retirement plan sales and relationship management to registered investment advisers (RIA) for Fidelity Investments, While at Fidelity, she also held senior roles in technology consulting and product management for Fidelity’s RIA division.

This hire is part of a growing and experienced team servicing the RIA industry for Black Diamond, including the most recent addition of former Schwab Advisor Services executive, David Welling, who joined as Chief Solutions Officer earlier this year. Lisowski will report to Welling, who is a member of the Black Diamond senior management team and oversees sales, marketing, product management, and client solutions.

The Markets March 15, 2010

U.S. Stock Funds Get Snubbed in February

Excluding domestic-stock funds, every other major asset class took in assets in February, according to the Morningstar Direct Fund Flows Update.
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Excluding domestic-stock funds, every other major asset class took in assets in February, according to the Morningstar Direct Fund Flows Update.

Last month, investors withdrew $3.7 billion from U.S. equity funds, for the fifth outflow in the last six months. Over the last 12 months, $21.3 billion has exited the asset class.     

Taxable-bond funds, which have dominated inflows since January 2009, posted inflows of $19.8 billion in February.      

Muni-bond funds have also experienced steady and strong inflows over the past several months. Inflows over the first two months of the year already surpass $10 billion, for the strongest start the asset class has ever experienced, Morningstar said.     

Money market funds, meanwhile, saw outflows of $71.1 billion in February, and $663.5 billion over the past 12 months. International-stock funds registered $4.6 billion in inflows in February.      

Foreign large-blend is the most popular international category so far in 2010, with inflows of $6.3 billion. However, over the past 12 months, the diversified emerging-markets category has taken in about the same amount of cash as the foreign large-blend category. Each category has experienced inflows over the last year of more than $19 billion.      

Templeton Global Bond has taken in more than $14.5 billion in assets over the past 12 months, second only to PIMCO Total Return in bond inflows. PIMCO Short-Term Bond experienced $6.1 billion in inflows over the same period, and its total net assets are now $10.6 billion.     

Other highlights of the Morningstar report include:

  • Many of the fastest-growing new funds that have launched over the past six months are associated with target-date funds, notably Fidelity Series Commodity Strategy, which is one of the underlying funds in Fidelity’s Freedom Target-Date series, and Fidelity Series Inflation-Protected Bond Index.
  • JPMorgan and T. Rowe Price began 2010 on a strong note, with year-to-date inflows of $5.3 billion and $3.8 billion, respectively.


The report is available here.

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