Ciaran O'Neill was named a director and member of the global equities...

Ciaran O'Neill was named a director and member of the global equities management team at Bank of Ireland Asset Management, and William Killeen will join the firm as a senior equity manager and member of the European equities team, said Anne Banks, senior vice president of international marketing. Those hires - together with the hirings of Paul Boyne and Ivan Fox late last year - will fill the gaps created when four senior portfolio managers left in September. Mr. O'Neill will move to Dublin from Boston. Mr. O'Neill was a portfolio manager for Fidelity Management & Research, managing the Fidelity Structured Large Cap Value and Fidelity Structured Mid Cap Value funds. Fidelity portfolio manager Bruce L. Dirks will assume responsibility for those funds, according to the company's website. Mr. Killeen was an investment manager with Setanta Asset Management; officials at Setanta weren't available by press time for comment on a replacement.

Jeffrey W. Maillet, a specialist in high-yield bank loans, opened his hedge fund to new investors today. His firm, Noble Asset Management, has been managing a multistrategy fund since February 2002 that incorporates long-short special situations, long-short high yield and long-short distressed securities. Mr. Maillet was a partner and portfolio manager on the distressed debt team at FrontPoint Partners before quitting to form his own firm, said Armel Leslie, a Noble spokesman.

Kneeland Youngblood was elected independent chairman of the board of trustees of the American AAdvantage Funds, said William F. Quinn, president of the fund family and board chairman since 1987. Mr. Youngblood, a co-founder and managing partner of Pharos Capital Group, has been on the fund's board for more than seven years. Mr. Youngblood was chosen roughly a year before the regulatory deadline for naming an independent chairman, in line with the desire of officials for the fund family - which had $12.3 billion in assets as of December 2004 - to be an early adopter of best practices, said Mr. Quinn. Six of the board's eight trustees are independent.