And the Money Management Institute names Lord Abbett's Mark Pennington chairman of its board. The Money Management Institute (MMI) honored three outstanding contributors to the separately managed account (SMA) industry at its annual convention in Philadelphia earlier this week. The MMI’s board named as SMA “pioneers” Jim Seuffert of Lockwood Advisors, Lawrence Sinsimer of Eaton Vance and Charles Widger of Brinker Capital.

“It’s a significant professional milestone,” says Widger, founder and CEO of Berwyn, Pa.-based Brinker, a third-party investment platform provider. “It’s a great thing to be recognized by your peers.”

But he views the award as a tribute to Brinker as much as it’s an honor to him personally. “I’m a symbol of what Brinker has managed to accomplish,” he says, adding that his partners John Coyne, Brinker’s president, and Tim Henry, its COO, are just as worthy of recognition by the industry. “[Brinker is] a good company made up of good people.”

Sinsimer says he is a “honored to be included in the company of” pioneers past and present – “people who have taken this industry from its infancy to where it is now.”

From nothing 30 years ago, SMA assets stood at $576.1 billion at the end of 2004, according to the MMI, a Washington, D.C.-based association for SMA managers and sponsors. The association expects industry assets reach $1.3 trillion by 2008.

Widger led the management buyout of Brinker from the Mutual Benefit Capital Companies in 1987, when the company had a staff of eight and $133 million in assets under management. With $3.4 billion in assets, Brinker now has 85 employees. A founding member of the MMI, Widger serves as the association’s membership committee.

Seuffert, who was vacationing with his family, couldn’t be reached for comment. A veteran of SMA sales and marketing, he is a founder, along with CEO Leonard Reinhart and former president Chris Tomecek of Lockwood Advisors, a third-party platform provider within Pershing, the Bank Of New York’s clearing division. Seuffert is COO of Lockwood/Pershing.

A respected advocate for the consultative approach to private wealth management, Sinsimer has headed manager Eaton Vance’s SMA business since late 2000. Before that he was national marketing director of Paine Webber’s investment counseling services. He is a founding member of the MMI and a member of its board.

The MMI also honored Dennis Bertrum, an SMA-industry veteran who died last summer. At the 2005 Pioneer Award Luncheon Lazard Asset Management managing director Charles Carroll, spoke of Bertrum’s commitment to the SMA business and his ability to see and bring out the best in his colleagues.

In addition to the public honors conferred on industry players this week, the MMI board met just before the convention got underway to elect a new chairman. As of today Mark Pennington, head of Lord Abbett’s private-client group, takes Peter Muratore’s spot as board chairman.

Under a new system of board governance, Muratore gets the title “past chair” through the end of March 2006. Lockwood’s Reinhart was named chairman elect of the MMI’s board for 2006-2007. –FWR