Deals & People August 25, 2017

Retirement Industry People Moves

Cetera Expands Retirement Business; Mercer Expands Leadership in Detroit Office; OneAmerica Names West Coast Relationship Executive.
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Cetera Expands Retirement Business

Cetera Financial Group has hired Adeline Wong as vice president, retirement plan fiduciary programs, and Drew Russell as program manager in the Cetera Retirement Plan Solutions group, which specializes in supporting retirement-focused financial advisers.

In her new role, Wong will focus on managing and expanding Cetera’s plan-focused fiduciary programs in order to accommodate a significant anticipated increase in demand for such programs among retirement plan advisers following initial implementation of the Department of Labor’s fiduciary rule. Previously, Wong served in a number of management roles at LPL Financial, including vice president at LPL Financial Retirement Partners. This role allowed her to oversee all retirement plan business including fee-based consulting. 

Within the Cetera Retirement Plan Solutions group, Russell will oversee the execution of Department of Labor compliance policies, as well as the design and management of participant engagement strategies. Prior to joining Cetera, he served in a number of roles at The Standard, including a leadership position with the company’s new client conversions group. 

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NEXT: Mercer Expands Leadership in Detroit Office

Mercer Expands Leadership in Detroit Office

Global consulting firm Mercer has announced the appointments of Jen Faifer and John Lapinski to key leadership roles in the firm’s Detroit office. Faifer recently assumed the role of Detroit office business leader for health. Lapinski has joined Mercer as a senior healthcare consultant.

Both will report to Eric Bassett, Mercer’s central market business leader for health.

Faifer has more than 12 years of experience in the employee benefits industry, having spent the past five years as Mercer’s Central Market Regulatory Resources Group leader. In addition, she serves as an adjunct professor at The John Marshall Law School in Chicago, where she teaches a range of employee benefits topics. Her J.D. is from Tulane University School of Law; and her bachelor’s degree in political science is from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

Lapinski brings 28 years of experience in employee benefits consulting to Mercer. Most recently, he served as Michigan market leader and Midwest region health practice leader for Conduent HR Services, responsible for client retention and business development of the firm’s health practice. He previously worked for Mercer between 1997 and 2002. His past roles included Michigan health and benefits consulting leader. He earned his master’s degree from Indiana University Southeast, and his bachelor’s degree in economics from Wake Forest University.

NEXT: OneAmerica Names West Coast Relationship Executive

OneAmerica Names West Coast Relationship Executive

Neil Garrett has joined OneAmerica as a relationship executive serving the West Coast region. He will be based in the company’s San Diego office. Garrett brings more than 26 years of experience in the retirement plan industry to his new role, having served in both provider and adviser roles. 

He specializes in mid- and large-sized institutional retirement plan clients. Garrett previously worked for Transamerica. Prior to returning to the provider side, Garrett worked as a registered investment adviser (RIA) within his own practice. He joined OneAmerica in July.

NEXT: Callan Names New CEO 

Callan Names New CEO

Institutional investment consulting firm Callan announced that current president and director of research Greg Allen will assume the title of CEO and president, effective September 1, 2017.

Meanwhile, current chairman and CEO Ron Peyton will assume the title of executive chairman. Callan is also shifting its legal corporate structure from a single S-Corp to a limited liability corporation (LLC). Callan says the reason for this structure change is to support the firm’s ongoing commitment to broadly distributed employee ownership.

“We are continuing the rollout of a succession plan that was put in place 10 years ago,” Peyton explains. “Greg and I have been managing the firm together since that time. No reporting lines are changing aside from Greg reporting to the Board, and I will continue to be an executive of the firm, involved in day-to-day management, and working with our valued clients.”

NEXT: OppenheimerFunds Hires Senior Business Consultant 

OppenheimerFunds Hires Senior Business Consultant

Paul Brunswick has joined global asset manager OppenheimerFunds as senior business consultant. He will represent the firm's CEO Advisor Institute development programs to advisers across the United States.

Brunswick has more than 30 years of experience in the financial services industry behind him. He’s worked closely with institutional and ultra-high-net-worth clients, as well as financial advisers and branch managers. He joins OppenheimerFunds from CEG Worldwide, where he led the corporate solutions division. Prior to CEG, he was the managing director of national business development for Smith Barney.

The CEO Advisor Institute programs include Compelling Conversations, Professional Practice, and Constructing and Managing a Synergistic Team. 

NEXT: John Hancock Retirement Names Taft Hartley Sales Manager

John Hancock Retirement Names Taft Hartley Sales Manager

John Hancock Retirement Plan Services has named Nick McParland national sales manager of mid, large and Taft-Hartley markets. The transition is effective September 1.

McParland has been with John Hancock since 2013, most recently responsible for new business sales and relationship management across the country in the Taft-Hartley area. The Taft-Hartley team will report to Scott Francolini, senior vice president of strategic relationship management, until McParland's successor is named.

Before joining John Hancock, McParland was director of institutional services at Intercontinental Real Estate and was responsible for raising capital for private equity real estate and hedge fund of funds from institutional investors. Before that, he held various positions at other financial organizations with responsibilities ranging from institutional sales to relationship management.

McParland earned a bachelor's degree in economics from St. Lawrence University.

NEXT: T. Rowe Price Names Next CFO

T. Rowe Price Names Next CFO
 
T. Rowe Price Group announced that Céline Dufétel will join the firm as vice president by December of this year. The firm also revealed she will become chief financial officer (CFO) and treasurer in the first quarter of 2018.

She will succeed Ken Moreland, who will continue as CFO until no later than the filing of the Form 10-K for the 2017 fiscal year in February 2018. Moreland plans to retire afterward following nearly 14 years of service to the firm.

As CFO, Céline will oversee all financial activities of the firm, as well as manage the various functions within the CFO group including finance, treasury, risk and audit. She also will assume responsibility for the corporate strategy team and lead the firm's relationships with analysts and T. Rowe Price Group stockholders.

Céline comes to T. Rowe Price from Neuberger Berman. She previously served as partner and head of the North American asset management practice at McKinsey & Company. She will be based at the firm's corporate headquarters in Baltimore.

NEXT: Paychex Acquires HR Outsourcing Holdings

Paychex Acquires HR Outsourcing Holdings

Paychex announced the acquisition of HR Outsourcing Holdings and all of its operating subsidiaries. HR Outsourcing Holdings is a national professional employer organization that provides human resource solutions to small and medium-sized businesses in more than 35 states.

The company is headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, and has approximately 140 employees “who will be offered the opportunity to become Paychex employees.” Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

NEXT: ERISA Attorney Joins The Wagner Law Group

ERISA Attorney Joins The Wagner Law Group

Patrice Maloney-Knauff has joined The Wagner Law Group, an ERISA and employee benefits law firm as of counsel.

Maloney-Knauff is a corporate attorney with more than 25 years of experience advising pension plans, insurance companies and investment managers. He specializes in ERISA plan investing, derivatives, and asset management. Prior to joining The Wagner Law Group, Maloney-Knauff served as Allstate Insurance Company's investment and business transactions corporate counsel for nearly two decades. In that role, she served as lead investment counsel to pension plans and advised Allstate and its investment clients on all matters relating to pension plan investments. She reviewed and negotiated ERISA plan investment transaction documents for transactions involving derivatives, private equity, hedge funds, securities lending, repurchase, and security forward transactions.

NEXT: Pacific Life Completes Pension Buy-In De-Risking TransactionPacific Life Completes Pension Buy-In De-Risking Transaction
 
Pacific Life Insurance Company announced the close of a $35 million secured buy-In transaction. The client is American Water Works Association (AWWA), an international nonprofit association located in Denver, Colorado.

“AWWA was pleased to be able to execute a strategy where we could effectively eliminate the financial risks of the plan and solidify our participants’ retirement benefits with a very strong company,” says Kevin Mann, chief financial officer of AWWA. “Now, we can go through the regulatory process of plan termination and focus on the administrative aspects without the risks and complications that would have been necessary with other approaches.”

Qualified Annuity Services (QAS) has been advising AWWA since 2013 in identifying risks and providing dynamic modeling of risk-transfer pricing.

“We were able to implement a strategy within a few critical weeks after more than four years of planning,” said Joe Bellersen, president of QAS. “We placed an annuity with Pacific Life earlier than AWWA’s five- to eight-year timeline for full plan termination and substantially under budget.”

NEXT: Wilshire Consulting Appoints Key Executives  

Wilshire Consulting Appoints Key Executives
 
Wilshire Consulting, the institutional investment advisory and outsourced chief investment officer business unit of Wilshire Associates, announced the appointment of four managing directors: Bradley Baker, Rose Dean, Ali Kazemi, and Ned McGuire.

Bradley Baker joined Wilshire in 2005 and provides consulting services to corporate and public pension funds, endowments, foundations and healthcare organizations. He will continue to serve as the chair of Wilshire Consulting’s private real assets committee in his new role.

Rose Dean specializes in providing consulting services to corporate and public pension funds, endowments, foundations and healthcare organizations. She joined Wilshire in 2015 after running a start-up alternative investment consulting business, where she advised on opportunities focused on alternative investment strategies. She spent the first half of her 16-year career in the financial markets as a fixed-income trader and a portfolio manager.

Ali Kazemi provides investment and risk management consulting services to public and corporate pension plans, foundations and endowments, and insurance companies. He joined Wilshire in 2001 and spent several years in product development and client servicing. He now runs the risk management team which he helped build at Wilshire Consulting.

Ned McGuire joined Wilshire in 2011 and is a member of Wilshire Consulting’s pension risk solutions group. He is responsible for researching and maintaining Wilshire’s proprietary asset allocation models, conducting asset allocation studies, and serving as an actuarial consultant to plan sponsors.

NEXT: Aviva Investors Names Executive Director

Aviva Investors Names Executive Director

Aviva Investors has announced the appointment of Tom Meyers as executive director and head of Americas client solutions,effective September 12, 2017.

In this role, Meyers will have overall responsibility for leading the institutional client solutions business and overseeing sub-adviser relationships in the Americas. He will also have local oversight responsibility for the client solutions team. Based in Chicago, he will have dual reporting lines to Mike Craston, CEO, and and Louise Kay, global head of client solutions.

Prior to joining Aviva Investors, Meyers was managing senior investment director at Legal and General Investment Management America, where he led the U.K. firm’s expansion into the U.S. market.

He will focus on accelerating Aviva Investors’ growth in the region, while increasing demand from major consultants and large pension plans for its outcome-oriented portfolio offerings.

Meyers earned a dual bachelor’s degree in organizational behavior/management and psychology from Brown University. He holds the chartered financial analyst designation and is a member of the CFA Institute and the CFA Society of Chicago.

NEXT: BPAS Hires Midwest External Wholesaler

BPAS Hires Midwest External Wholesaler

BPAS, a national provider of retirement plan and fund administration, announced that Mike Hahn has joined the firm as an external wholesaler located in the Midwest. Hahn’s focus will be on developing the Midwest market in partnership with financial intermediaries and advisers.

Hahn has served in business development at Security National Bank and in sales at Billings and Company.

Through a structure implemented in 2016, BPAS services financial partners through a combined approach involving external wholesalers and sales relationship managers. This strategy delivers onsite assistance to bid and win plans, along with relationship management services to maintain successful books of business. Hahn will be assigned an initial caseload of financial intermediary partners and will add new partnerships through his sales efforts.

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