As 2016 wound down to its close, here is the latest weekly summary of moves in the North America wealth management market.

Equity Concepts,  a comprehensive financial services firm based in Richmond, Virginia, appointed wealth manager G F "Penn" Pendleton III to its ranks. Pendleton works with the firm's wealth management team of Shannon Carter, MBA, CFP, and Jinette Chiappetta, CPA. Pendleton has more than 40 years's experience in banking, investments and insurance. Prior to joining Equity Concepts, Pendleton spent more than 16 years as a principal and director of Clark/Bardes.

PIMCO appointed Jeffrey Thompson - currently an executive vice president and portfolio manager in the firm’s New York office - to its commercial real estate team. Prior to joining the global investment manager, Thompson was a managing director and co-head of the commercial real estate group at Annaly Capital Management, where he oversaw an origination team investing in commercial real estate debt and equity, as well as the asset management and underwriting groups.

RBC Wealth Management recruited a new advisory group to join its Lincoln, Nebraska branch, according to David Myers, director of the firm's Cedar Rapids complex. The McEwen Group is led by Tim McEwen, a financial advisor with more than 13 years' industry experience from Swiss banking giant UBS. Joining him were Bradley Schindler, senior financial associate, and Brooke Wimes, senior registered client associate. Collectively, the trio manage $307 million in client assets and have $1.5 million in production. 

Wealth, capital markets and investment house Baird appointed three financial advisors to its private wealth management group in Morristown, New Jersey, and West Palm Beach in Florida. The advisors are Robert Browne, (Morristown), bringing assets under management of $146 million; Keith Epstein, (West Palm Beach.) $243 million (combined with Oremland); and Andrew  Oremland, (West Palm Beach) $243 million with Epstein. Epstein and Oremland were joined by client specialist Melissa Mills.

Key Private Bank, part of US-listed KeyCorp, appointed George Mateyo as chief investment officer, a newly-created role. As part of the role, Mateyo is based in Cleveland, Ohio, and reports to Joe Calabrese, national head of investments at Key Private Bank. Previously, Mateyo served as senior director of investments at the Cleveland Clinic. He also served as a senior consultant and MD at Hartland & Co., an investment consultancy.

Ziegler, a privately-owned wealth manager, appointed Liz Allen as vice president and financial advisor within its Altamonte Springs, Florida office. Allen has nearly 22 years' experience in wealth management, having previously served as an associate vice preisdent and financial advisor with Ameriprise Financial Services.