With Debbie Fuhr landing at BGI, the hiring continues apace...

I woke up this morning to find that Murray had broken the story about global ETF guru Debbie Fuhr landing at BGI. I think it's a great sign for the ETF business and investors, because it likely means that BGI is going to continue to focus on general ETF education and research. At times it has seemed that the ETF industry, including iShares, has backed down a bit from general educational efforts and focused on simply selling products.

Not that there is anything wrong with selling products, but the big fight is that of ETFs vs. mainly wanting an array of financial products including overpriced and otherwise-flawed mutual funds, annuities and closed-end funds. When the word gets out about the ETF story in general, the entire industry benefits from increased flows, and the product offerings get better. Indeed, with the waves that the ETF industry has made, the mutual fund industry has improved, and now some major players are beginning to look at the ETF structure.

And of course, as U.S. News notes, ETFs are eventually going to overrun traditional mutual funds.

And that, as with Vanguard originally entering the ETF business, can only help the BGIs, SSgAs, PowerShares and all the rest. So it's nice to see the focus still being there to a degree, because as much as ETFs are now in the public eye, the level of understanding of the various product offerings is still enormously wanting.

As a side note, BGI continues its trend of stockpiling many of the biggest names with some of the best media relationships in the business. Just off the top of my head, I would put Sue Thompson and Noel Archard from Vanguard, Dodd Kittsley from SSgA, Darek Wojnar from UBS and now Debbie Fuhr on that list. All of those folks have an investor focus about them, and have a lot of good will around the industry. And clearly, BGI can afford them.

It will be interesting to see Morgan Stanley researchers Dodd Kittsley (though he was on the US team) and Debbie Fuhr in a sense reunited.

Murray notes the hiring of Eric Rosenbaum to our team at IU.com. Keep your eyes open, because we're adding another 4 mainly editorial types to our staff in the coming days. And we're broadening our focus globally, while also deepening our coverage in the U.S. and improving our data. So there will be a lot going on at our publications and events in the coming year.

Sorry, I can't stop talking about the dollar ... but it's into the 1.41's even as the Feds announce they're taking over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

So hey, the global economy is in the crapper, but at least it's going to cost less to buy those Italian shoes and fill up the SUV.