New York-based Neuberger Berman also announced it renamed its managed accounts practice the Managed Account Group to more closely reflect the group‚s operations. The Managed Account Group formerly was known as the Consultant Services Group.
Established in 1988, Neuberger‚s Managed Account Group has grown into one of the investment industry‚s leading SMA products based on assets under management. According to Cerulli Associates, during the fourth quarter of 2002 alone, Neuberger Berman increased its SMA assets 14.5% to $5.7 billion, ranking it among the largest SMA investment managers.
For more information, visit www.nb.com.
SMA Program Enhanced
Oberon Financial Technology of Sunnyvale, Calif., has introduced multi-asset class portfolios in its separate account and mutual fund wrap program. Fifteen portfolios use specialized asset-class managers with an overlay manager to direct an asset-allocated portfolio of equities within a single account. The account minimum is $100,000. For more information, visit www.oberonft.com.
Principal-Protected Funds
Black Diamond Asset Management of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., has launched a family of indexed principal-protected mutual funds. All Black Diamond funds seek to meet or exceed the performance of their benchmark index over the seven-year investment period through active management of index options, exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and ETF options.
Day-to-day investment activity will be managed by Broadmark Asset Management, a New York-based registered investment advisor. All the funds offer 100% principal protection at maturity. For a prospectus, e-mail [email protected] or call (954) 617-1700, ext. 401.
Firm Recognized
Forrester Research Inc. has rated ByAllAccounts Inc. of Boston first in account aggregation in its TechStrat-egy Report, "Aggregation: Who‚s Best for Wealth Management." Forrester analyzed six aggregation vendors utilizing criteria that included data gathering, quality and flexible delivery. Also, ByAllAccounts has added five new financial advisory firm clients. Among them are Highmount Capital, Friedman & Associates and Wade Financial.