Jul. 3--A New Market resident has launched a financial investment advisement firm.

Henry L. Becker Jr., a certified financial planner, started Sustainable Investment Strategies, specializing in exchange-traded fund investment management.

Exchange-traded funds are securities that represent pooled funds invested in shares of an underlying class of asset, or specific regions or commodities.

The reason they differ from mutual funds is they can be traded on stock exchanges during the day, unlike the units of mutual funds, which acquire their net asset values at the end of the trading session.

The concept is relatively new. The object is to offer investors some liquidity on investments, without depriving them of risk mitigating diversification benefits that mutual funds offer. In addition, ETFs also have services of professional fund managers who manage the portfolios, like in mutual funds.

Becker is the founder of the Frederick Young Professionals Social and Business Networking Group.

He was formerly managing partner and senior investment adviser with an investment firm in Northern Virginia.

"The desire to strike out on my own was formed by the realization that both actively managed mutual funds and the large brokerage houses have really let investors down," Becker said. "These professional money managers have failed investors. At the fund level, mutual fund managers as a group have struggled mightily to match or worse yet to under perform benchmark indexes. Additionally, the failure of the large brokerage houses have taught us that they cannot keep their own houses in order."

Becker is versed in the utilization and impact of investing in regards to tax, estate planning and retirement planning. He is the editor of the ETFGPS.com blog.

A veteran of the U.S. Air Force, Becker holds a bachelor's degree in European history from the University of Pittsburgh. A native of Pittsburgh, he relocated to Maryland in 1999 and lives in the county with his wife and three sons.

For information, call 1-800-717-2527 or e-mail hbecker@trendsentinel.com.

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