Withers Bergman ramped up its offering for clients with complex cross-border tax affairs with a new partner on the team.

Patrick Cox joined Withers Bergman’s international corporate tax group from Brown Rudnick, where he was chair of the firm’s tax group. He helps clients develop effective tax strategies for cross-border and domestic business transactions. He works with clients such as businesses, investors and financial intermediaries.

Steve Barimo joined AM Global Wealth Management as a founding partner, co-owner and manager.

Barimo was previously the chief marketing officer and head of business development for GenSpring Family Offices, where he oversaw these efforts between 2001 and 2012. At AM Global he will work with founder Andrew Mehalko on leading the firm and making strategic, investment and operating decisions.

Before joining GenSpring, Barimo was president of Sageworks, a financial advisory software firm, which he joined after a decade in investment banking. He started his career at Lehman Brothers in New York City.

Los Angeles, CA-headquartered Aristotle Capital Management took on Sandra Incontro as a portfolio manager and managing director. Incontro’s areas of expertise include research, risk management, client service and operations.

Incontro has worked in the investment management industry since 1993 and was latterly president and portfolio/relationship manager at Metropolitan West Capital Management.

Prior to that, she served as a vice president and senior investment strategist at Strong Capital Management; as a senior portfolio analyst at SSI Investment Management; and as a senior associate at Wilshire Associates.

Bank of the West promoted Edward Mora, who is responsible for leading the firm’s Orange County’s wealth management team, to senior vice president.

Mora has over 20 years of experience advising affluent and high net worth business owners in the areas of wealth planning, investment solutions and private banking. 

Texas-based Houston Trust Company, the trust and investment management firm, appointed a new chief executive, chairman and chief financial officer.

CEO Lee Lahourcade succeeded William McCain, who retired after 20 years at the firm. Meanwhile, James D’Agostino was named as chairman of the board, while Stephanie Pollock joined as CFO.

Lahourcade has over 30 years of investment management and research experience, including over ten years in executive management at Vaughan Nelson, a Houston-based investment firm.  

D’Agostino retired as chairman and CEO of Encore Bancshares, following its sale in 2012. He has over 40 years of experience in banking, wealth management and insurance, including 13 years with American General Corporation and ten at Citibank.

Pollock was latterly a senior vice president, comptroller and chief accounting officer at Encore Bancshares, prior to its acquisition. She is a certified public accountant and has over 15 years of industry experience.

US Trust, part of Bank of America, appointed Ty Schlobohm, a whistleblower in the Trevor Cook Ponzi scheme, as a private client advisor and senior vice president in Minneapolis, MN.

Schlobohm is known for helping the Federal Bureau of Investigation gather evidence against Cook, who pleaded guilty to mail and tax fraud in the summer of 2009 and was sentenced to 25 years in prison for leading what “ultimately became a $160 million swindle.”

Prior to US Trust, Schlobohm worked as a portfolio manager at New York-based G2 Trading, and before that as a managing director at Cherry Tree, a financial advisory firm offering investment banking, investment management and wealth management services.

BNY Mellon Wealth Management ramped up its teams serving the Florida and Pennsylvania markets.

In Miami, FL, Michael Cabanas joined as a senior director. He reports to Craig Sutherland, BNY Mellon Wealth Management's southeast US president, and Tim Goering, managing director of Florida sales.

He spent the past seven years as a managing director at Fiduciary Trust International, and between 2000 and 2006 was a private banker at JP Morgan.

Meanwhile, further north in Philadelphia, McBee Butcher joined the firm as a senior portfolio officer. He reports to portfolio team leader Arnold Johnsen.

Butcher has about 20 years of experience in financial services and investment management, most recently as a senior portfolio manager at McCabe Capital Managers, and a vice president at Drexel Morgan & Co.

HighTower added MK Wealth Management, an advisory team in Long Island, NY, to its partnership.

MK Wealth Management’s principal, Mark Kravietz, has over 25 years of experience in the financial services sector, most recently at UBS Financial Services. He joined HighTower as a partner and managing director. 

Kravietz manages $300 million in assets for affluent families, individual clients, closely-held businesses and non-profits. He specializes in asset allocation, liability and estate planning, and portfolio construction. Other members of his team include Catherine Crunden, a senior wealth management associate, and Stefanie Andors, a senior analyst.

BMO Harris Private Banking, part of BMO Financial Group, named Jennifer Muench as a vice president and managing director in British Columbia.

Muench will be responsible for implementing the overall business strategy for BMO Harris Private Banking in British Columbia - including BMO’s Asian private banking business - and will oversee its trust, banking and investment operations.

Northern Trust named W Brett Rees as head of wealth management for the mid-Atlantic region. He succeeded Joanie Stringer, who relocated to Miami, FL, to serve as a senior wealth strategist focused on business development.

Rees will be based in Washington, DC, with oversight responsibilities for the firm’s business spanning Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Delaware. He will lead a team of around 30 financial services professionals including portfolio managers, bankers, trust advisors and wealth strategists.

Meanwhile, Rees will also head up Northern Trust’s foundation and institutional advisory services on the East Coast. This unit provides investment services to small- and medium-sized foundations and non-profit organizations. He will report to Dave Blowers, executive vice president and head of the eastern region. 

Rees spent the past six years at Northern Trust as national sales director for wealth management and has worked at the firm for 16 years overall. Before joining Northern Trust, he held a variety of wealth management and commercial banking positions at Bank of America, Bank of Boston and Wachovia.

RBC Wealth Management brought in Michael Melton as branch director at its San Diego, CA, office. The move expanded the Canadian bank's presence in Southern California, which includes offices in Beverly Hills, Century City, Escondido, La Jolla, Long Beach, Newport Beach, Pasadena and Manhattan Beach.

Melton has over 20 years of industry experience and joined RBC Wealth Management from Morgan Stanley Smith Barney (now Morgan Stanley Wealth Management), where he was most recently complex director of the San Diego and Palm Desert market.

New York-listed Genworth Financial added its tenth board member in the shape of former senator Kent Conrad, who joined as an independent director.

Conrad served as a US senator representing North Dakota between January 1987 and January 2013. At the time of his retirement from the Senate, he was chairman of the Senate budget committee.  

Boston Private Bank & Trust Company made a number of leadership changes, in a move affecting staff in senior management and market leadership roles on both the East and West coasts.

Mark Thompson, chief executive and president, said the decision to redefine the roles is part of the bank's growth plan in the areas of wealth management and private banking. 

New roles at the bank included:

•James Brown, executive vice president, director of commercial banking and credit management;

•Gisela LoPiano, senior vice president, chief lending officer - East Coast;

•Robert Nentwig, senior vice president, chief lending officer - West Coast;

•George Schwartz, executive vice president, chief operating officer;

•Torrance Childs, senior vice president, national director of deposit management;

•Mary Fischer, senior vice president, director of West Coast banking offices;

•Nicholas Hofer, senior vice president, West Coast business leader;

•Jeremy Parker, senior vice president, treasurer;

•John Sullivan, executive vice president, investment management and trust, and residential mortgage; and

•Elizabeth Worrick, senior vice president, national residential mortgage sales manager.

All of the individuals mentioned have worked there for some time.

Additionally, the bank added five individuals to its policy group, consisting of senior management and department heads who oversee the day-to-day management of the bank and set its overall policy and strategic direction.

They were: Thomas Anderson, senior vice president, chief investment officer; LoPiano; Nentwig; Parker; and Jennifer Willis, senior vice president, director of marketing.

JHS Capital Advisors, a dual-registered broker/dealer and RIA, appointed Allison Hanna as a financial advisor in Portland, OR.

Hanna will work alongside a team of advisors including Dan Mancuso, first vice president of investments, and Carrie Carpenter, a senior registered client associate. Hanna joined the financial services industry from the world of professional athletics, having participated in the Ladies Professional Golf Association tours since 2005.

She joined JHS's Portland office, which was launched in July 2012 and is the firm's second largest, with 20 employees, after its headquarters in Tampa, FL.

Heartland Bank and Trust Co created a wealth management division based in Normal, IL. Kim Larson was appointed as a senior vice president and will run the division. He previously ran the wealth management business for Citizens First National Bank in Princeton, which was acquired by Heartland.

He is relocating from Princeton to Bloomington-Normal this spring, while Linda Grove, a trust officer, will lead the Princeton team.

Deutsche Bank hired Raphael Zagury as head of key client partners and wealth investment advisory for Latin America – a new position at the bank.

Zagury recently left Bank of America Merrill Lynch and he is set to join Deutsche Bank in about three months, based in the bank’s New York office.

He reports to Dario Schiraldi, the London-based head of the global client group for Deutsche Asset and Wealth Management, and Ben Pace, chief investment officer of wealth management in the Americas.

In his new role he will work with ultra high net worth clients in Latin America on investments, with Mexico and Brazil being important UHNW markets within the wider region.

He joined Merrill in 2007 and was head of UHNW investment solutions. Before that, he was a vice president at Goldman Sachs.

US Bank’s Private Client Reserve, which targets clients with at least $1 million in investible assets, continued a raft of recent hires by adding Heather Borelli as a wealth management advisor in Naples, FL.

Borelli has over 20 years of experience in accounting, finance, trusts and wealth management, during which time she has worked primarily with high net worth families. Before joining PCR, Borelli served as senior associate of Well Fargo's Abbot Downing office in Naples, where she managed client relationships for the Southeast region.

Atlantic Trust, Invesco’s private wealth management business, brought in Denise Whennen as a senior vice president and business development officer at its Chicago, IL, office.

Whennen's appointment was part of a firm-wide initiative to invest in key growth regions, Atlantic Trust said. The Chicago office is the firm’s third largest and has over $2.2 billion in assets under management, as at end-December 2012.

In her new role Whennen will work on fostering new client relationships and strengthening associations with intermediary referral sources, alongside Jeffrey Jacobs, who leads Chicago's business development efforts, and the client service teams.

She has over 28 years of industry experience, having previously served as a vice president and business development officer at RMB Capital Management. Before that, she was a vice president and financial advisor at Bernstein Wealth Management.

Los Angeles, CA-based wealth managers Aaron Cook and Bambi Holzer joined forces to launch Wealth and Income Management Group.

Wealth & Income Management Group provides financial planning, investment management, risk management, and estate and business transition services for individuals, families, corporations and foundations.  

The firm has a presence in Beverly Hills, CA, and Newport Beach, CA, with a satellite office on the East Coast. It has around $100 million in assets under management.

Cook was most recently the co-founder of Steadfast Income REIT and founder of Steadfast Capital Markets Group, where he served as the president and chief executive to develop and launch the initial offering of shares in the REIT.

ACE Private Risk Services, the high net worth personal insurance business, named Robert Courtemanche as chairman and Mary Boyd as division president. 

Courtemanche joined ACE in 2008 as division president of ACE Private Risk Services, while Boyd joined in 2010 as senior vice president and chief administrative officer of the division. She was appointed as chief operating officer in January 2012.

As chairman, Courtemanche will focus on long-term strategic issues and external relationships for ACE Private Risk Services. Meanwhile, Boyd will manage the day-to-day running of ACE Private Risk Services’ operations, including developing and executing near and long-term strategic plans.

Boston Private Bank & Trust Company appointed Patrick Kavey as a vice president and sales professional within its investment management, wealth advisory and trust services group.

Kavey has 12 years of investment management experience and will be responsible for new business acquisition to help the company expand in the New England area. He was previously a vice president at Fidelity Investments, before which he served as a vice president at BNY Mellon and Wellesley, MA-based GW & Wade.

Robert Reilly was appointed as chief financial officer of PNC Financial Services Group, with effect from the third quarter, when current CFO Richard Johnson retires.

Reilly has led PNC’s asset management group - which includes its Wealth Management, Capitol Advisors and Hawthorn Asset Management businesses - since 2005.

Reilly joined PNC Bank in 1987 and has held numerous management positions in investment and commercial banking. Prior to assuming his current role, he was deputy head of PNC Advisors.

Succeeding Reilly as head of asset management and joining PNC’s executive committee will be Orlando Esposito, who is currently corporate banking executive vice president.

Delaware-headquartered WSFS Bank reinforced its private banking business by appointing Denise Allen and Laura Phillips - latterly of Wilmington Trust - as portfolio manager and vice president/relationship manager respectively.

Allen provides client support in the delivery and maintenance of credit and deposit products in southern Delaware. Prior to WSFS, she spent 31 years at Wilmington Trust, which is part of M&T Bank.

Phillips serves WSFS Wealth Management clients, while also working to develop new relationships throughout southern Delaware. She was at Wilmington Trust for 35 years.    

Meanwhile, the bank hired Bob Matsko - whose previous experience includes six years as a financial advisor at Merrill Lynch Pierce Fenner & Smith - as a vice president and commercial real estate relationship manager.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch confirmed the hire of two advisors from Morgan Stanley Wealth Management in Minnesota and New Jersey.

In Minnesota, Mark Johnson joined as senior vice president at the Bloomington office, which is managed by Mark Eckerline. He spent over 20 years at Morgan Stanley, where he managed some $192 million in client assets and produced over $2 million annually.

Meanwhile, in New Jersey Brian Moore stepped into Merrill’s Red Bank office, where Peter Ardolino is branch manager.

Talmer Bank and Trust, a subsidiary of Troy, MI-headquartered Talmer Bancorp, hired Mark Jannott as managing director and wealth advisor. Jannott will manage investment portfolios and provide investment advice to high net worth and private banking clients.

He has over 25 years of financial services and wealth management experience, having previously served as senior vice president and managing director of investment and estate planning at Greenleaf Trust, a Michigan chartered bank.

BNY Mellon made a number of senior management changes within its investment services business, as the New York-listed firm looks to enhance its presence and capabilities in the investment services space.

Samir Pandiri was named as chief executive of global asset servicing, reporting to Tim Keaney, global CEO of investment services. Pandiri was formerly CEO of asset servicing for the Americas.

Lou Maiuri is now deputy CEO of asset servicing globally, reporting to Pandiri. Maiuri will continue in his role as head of the global financial institutions group within the asset servicing business, as well as overseeing the alternative investment services group and the asset servicing Latin American business.

Meanwhile, Chris Kearns was appointed as CEO of depositary receipts globally, reporting to Keaney. He was formerly deputy CEO, before which he was responsible for this business in the Asia-Pacific region.

Michael Cole-Fontayn, who has overseen the global depositary receipts business since 2008, will now focus full-time on his role as chairman of Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and as an executive committee member for BNY Mellon.

Washington Wealth Management, a hybrid RIA firm, recruited a veteran advisory team to staff a new office in California’s Orange County.

Pearce Saunders Murray Wealth Management is made up of three advisors and has around $160 million in assets under management. It is the first team to staff Washington’s new 3,500-square-foot office in Brea, CA.

The latest team to have joined the firm is comprised of Janet Pearce, Bradley Saunders and Krista Murray, who all joined from Morgan Stanley. They work with wealthy individuals and institutions on investments, estate planning, and retirement and college funding, with a focus on fee-based business.

Janney Montgomery Scott relocated one of its senior vice presidents to Charlotte, NC, to build out its presence there.

Andrew Kistler, regional manager for the Southeast at Janney, joined in October 2012 and has been working temporarily at the Washington, DC, branch office. He moved to set up a regional hub in Charlotte, from which he will lead recruiting efforts.

He will work with Charlotte branch manager Stuart Singer, who set up Janney’s office in that market in 2003.

Homrich Berg, the independent wealth management firm based in Atlanta, GA, appointed Robin Aiken as director of the firm.

Aiken joined Homrich Berg in 2005, having previously worked at an independent financial planning firm for eight years. She has over 15 years of wealth management experience in the areas of investment planning, retirement planning, cash flow analysis and income tax planning. 

New York-listed First Republic Bank added Reynold Levy - president of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York since 2002 - to its board of directors.

Levy was elected as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and is currently chairman of the board at the Charles H Revson Foundation, as well as a member of the board of overseers of the international rescue committee and a trustee of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America.  

Altius Associates, the private equity advisory and fund-of-funds firm, appointed William Charlton as a partner and head of US investments.

Charlton will be based in the firm’s office in Richmond, VA, and will report to Brad Young, head of investment.

Charlton joined Altius from the University of Texas at Austin, where he was a senior lecturer in finance and an associate director of The Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst Center for Private Equity Finance. He has previously worked for consultants BH Equity Research and Context Private Equity Alpha, a fund-of-funds manager.

New York-listed Signature Bank brought in two private client banking teams to operate from a new private client office - currently being planned - in Staten Island, NY.

Larry Goldberg, group director and senior vice president, leads a four-strong team comprised of Flora Vavallo and Anthony Shafer - both associate group directors and vice presidents - and senior client associate Lauren Mattera.

The group joined from Citibank in Staten Island, where most of the team have worked together for about nine years. Goldberg has spent the past 18 years overseeing Citibank branches in Manhattan and Staten Island, most recently as a branch manager and senior vice president in Victory Boulevard.

Meanwhile, Guy Gioeli also joined as group director and senior vice president.

Gioeli also heads a four-person team who have worked together for almost five years at Citibank’s Hylan Boulevard branch, which is also located on Staten Island and is where Gioeli previously served as a senior vice president and branch manager.

Linda Mulroy and Annette Lucas-Thomas were both named as associate group directors and vice presidents within Gioeli's team, while Shari Gutkin was appointed as a senior client associate.

BMO Private Bank, part of BMO Financial Group, added Bill Sperling, Patricia Bostrom and Bill McAleer to its local advisory board in Seattle, WA.

Sperling retired after 18 years with The Seattle Foundation, where he was the vice president of foundation affairs.

Bostrom had owned the Bostrom Law Offices in Seattle since 1988, while McAleer had been with Voyager Capital since he co-founded the company in 1997.

US Bank’s Private Client Reserve, which targets clients with at least $1 million in investible assets, appointed a senior portfolio manager and a trust officer in Minneapolis, MN.

Paul Springmeyer, senior portfolio manager, has over 16 years of investment experience and was previously a portfolio strategist within US Bancorp’s asset management group. In that role, he was responsible for the firm’s research and due diligence of investment vehicles including separately-managed accounts, mutual funds and exchange-traded products.

Before joining US Bancorp, Springmeyer worked at UBS Financial Services and Piper Jaffray.

Meanwhile, John Ostrand, a trust officer, will administer trusts for high net worth clients and coordinate financial, tax, investment and legal services for both his clients and trusts. 

Prior to joining US Bank, Ostrand worked as a senior trust officer, portfolio manager and wealth advisor at US Trust’s Minneapolis office. He also spent several years as a branch manager at Charles Schwab & Co in St Paul, MN, where he also managed offices in Rochester and Sioux Falls.

Barclays’ head of wealth and investment management in the Americas, Mitch Cox, stepped down from the role after having been in the job since October 2009.

Cox left the role to "pursue interests outside the firm," the bank said.

Based in Manhattan, Cox reported to Thomas Kalaris, chief executive of the bank's global wealth and investment management business. Kalaris, who is also executive chairman of Barclays Americas, will run the unit until a replacement is found.

Joseph Field, of counsel at the law firm Withers Bergman, was appointed to the advisory board of Greenwich, CT-based Family Office Association, a global membership organization exclusive to single family offices and families of wealth.

Based in New York, Field’s practice focuses on structuring the affairs and estates of domestic and international families including family offices, wealthy entrepreneurs and celebrities.

He recently returned to Withers Bergman in New York, having spent the past few years in Hong Kong advising wealthy families in Asia. He is a registered foreign lawyer in Hong Kong as well as in the UK. He is admitted to the bar in California, Washington, DC, and New York.

BMO Private Bank hired Peter Koleske as a vice president and private banker in Milwaukee, WI.

Koleske has over 27 years of experience in the financial services industry and specializes in serving high net worth individuals, families and organizations.

While based in Milwaukee, Koleske will focus on the greater Milwaukee area, as well as Racine and Kenosha.

Morgan Stanley Wealth Management added a trio of advisors from UBS, bolstering its Park Avenue, NY, and Knoxville, TN, offices.

In Knoxville, Scott Sexton joined an existing MSWM team – The Venable Cantey Pruitt and Sexton Team – reporting to branch manager David Elias. He had prior assets of $173 million and production of $1.035 million. The team he joined manages around $700 million assets.

Guggenheim Partners expanded its real estate and infrastructure investment platform by introducing a dedicated North American infrastructure investment team.

The initiative is led by Henry Silverman, who joined the firm in early 2012 as vice chairman of Guggenheim Investments.

Silverman was named as global head of real estate and infrastructure, responsible for managing and coordinating activity for the firm's entire real estate business.

The infrastructure team will invest across the capital structure including equity, structured equity and debt-related products, with an initial focus on core energy infrastructure assets in the US, Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean.

Miller/Russell & Associates, an RIA based in Phoenix, added seven members to its team. Four of the hires joined from GenSpring Family Offices.

Evan Judge joined Miller/Russell as a senior client associate on the wealth and investment advisory team. He was formerly a relationship manager with GenSpring.

Lia Whisler joined the firm as a senior client associate but mainly focusing on the institutional side of the business, where she will help manage retirement plans and foundations. She will also work directly with a few private wealth clients. She previously worked at Vanguard.

Matthew Walker joined as a client associate, responsible for providing investment advisory, tax planning, tax compliance and wealth management services to clients. Previously, he worked as a senior associate in the wealth management/tax preparation division for GenSpring.

Ron McKee joined as a senior client administrator. Previously, he spent around seven years with Inlign Wealth Management, which was acquired by GenSpring in 2008. At Inlign he managed the operations group for the western region.

Jessica Cobb was hired as a client administrator at Miller/Russell, after having spent more than six years with GenSpring in Phoenix.

In other hires, Lisa Cobb was appointed controller for the firm, having previously been a staff accountant for NPL Construction, and Brenda Bernardi was hired as business operations manager. Before joining, she was most recently director of operations at Ballet Arizona, and has been involved in the arts for many years in the area.

Glenmede hired Andrew Kirkpatrick as vice president of wealth advisory in its Cleveland office.

Kirkpatrick previously worked at Parkwood, a single family office and limited purpose trust company. There, he worked on estate planning with family members and provided fiduciary counsel and trust administration services to Parkwood Trust Company.

The Private Client Reserve, a unit of US Bank that targets high net worth clients with over $1 million in investable assets, hired Robert Stevenson as a managing director for Florida and a senior portfolio manager in Palm Beach.

Stevenson previously worked at Northern Trust, where he spent 14 years working with HNW individuals, families and foundations. He also previously worked within the personal and corporate trust departments at SunTrust Bank of South Florida.

Fiduciary Trust Company International, a wholly-owned subsidiary of New York-listed Franklin Resources, appointed Jeffrey MacDonald as a managing director and senior portfolio manager within its fixed income team.

MacDonald will manage fixed income portfolios for individuals, families and institutions. He has over 20 years of experience across all sectors of the global fixed income market.

Prior to his appointment, MacDonald was a senior portfolio manager at Cutwater Asset Management, where he oversaw a team that was responsible for some $15 billion in fixed income assets. He also previously co-managed 40 multi-sector portfolios at Hartford Investment Management Company.

Morgan Stanley appointed Chris Randazzo, latterly of Bank of America Merrill Lynch, to head technology for its wealth and investment management business.

Randazzo was most recently the head of technology for Bank of America Merrill Lynch's Global Wealth and Investment Management business.

He will take over the Morgan Stanley role in the near future from Moira Kilcoyne, who was recently appointed chief operating officer of wealth management at Morgan Stanley. That role was previously held by Jeff Hack, who will become a senior client advisor focusing on client segmentation projects.

KPMG, the "Big Four" audit, tax and advisory firm, strengthened its alternative investment funds unit by adding two federal tax managing directors to its offices in Los Angeles and New York.

Nancy Chan is based in Los Angeles and has 25 years of experience in the financial services sector, including an earlier role as a senior manager within KPMG’s federal tax practice.  

Most recently, she worked at Hellman and Friedman, a private equity firm, where she served as a tax director. In that role, she was responsible for tax planning and research, as well as participation in tax issues relating to acquisitions, restructuring and tax audits.

Meanwhile, Nader Karimi joined as a managing director of federal tax and asset management in New York. He joined KPMG from Goldman Sachs Fund Services, where he was the global head of tax and product development. Before that, he was the assistant vice president and global tax manager at HSBC Security Services.

Karimi will focus on expanding relationships with and serving hedge fund and private equity clients in areas such as the implementation of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act.

New York-listed Regions Bank named Anne Copeland as head of its private wealth management business. 

Copeland will lead the firm's banking, trust and investment management services to affluent and high net worth individuals and families. She will oversee a team of over 500 private wealth management associates.

She has over 30 years of industry experience and joined Regions Bank in April last year as an executive vice president, responsible for managing strategy and client solutions for the wealth management group.

Prior to joining Regions, she was an executive vice president and senior managing director for Wells Fargo’s wealth management group in Northern California. She also led the firm's California investment management and trust unit and served as a senior vice president and director of fiduciary services.

Jim Boothe took over from Michael Mayfield as chief investment officer at Santa Barbara Asset Management, an affiliate of Nuveen Investments. 

Mayfield, who joined Santa Barbara Asset Management in the mid 1990s, is retiring from the industry.

Boothe joined the firm in the 2002 from USAA Investment Management and will continue to manage his dividend-focused growth strategies.

OppenheimerFunds appointed Laton Spahr as portfolio manager of its Value, Select Value and Small- & Mid- Cap Value funds, with effect from March 11.

Spahr is responsible for all related strategies and will also serve as co-portfolio manager of the Oppenheimer Equity Fund. Spahr joined from Columbia Management Investment Advisors, where he was a senior portfolio manager for value and income strategies across institutional and retail investment channels.

He brought with him a team comprised of Eric Hewitt, Kyle Bergacker and Daniel Hozian, which he will lead. 

Morgan Stanley Wealth Management hired Victor Camara - latterly of Bank of America Merrill Lynch - as an advisor in Miami, FL. Camara had been at Merrill for over 10 years and managed some $200 million in client assets.

Richmond, VA-headquartered RiverFront Investment hired Brad Wear as its director for the western region. Wear is latterly of Morgan Stanley Wealth Management, where he was a vice president and financial advisor in the Pacific Northwest.

At RiverFront, he will partner with Rutherfoord Ferguson, a regional sales consultant, to provide sales and marketing support to financial advisors.