State Street Global Advisors, the investment management arm of State Street Corporation, has appointed a head for its exchange traded funds business in Australia.

Amanda Skelly will assumes the newly-created responsibility for driving the Australian ETF operations' business strategy, product development and promotion to both retail and institutional sectors. 

Skelly joins from Russell Investments, where she worked for nearly 10 years most recently as head of business strategy, sales, marketing and product management. Prior to that, she served ING Australia, Insurance Australia Group and Morgan Stanley. She reports directly Frank Henze, the Hong Kong-based head of SPDR ETFs for Asia-Pacific.

Also newly appointed is Shaun Parkin as business development manager for wholesale ETF sales, reporting to Skelly. Parkin joins from Lonsec and in his new capacity will work with the institutional business development team.

Both appointments are effective immediately.

State Street Global Advisors has been operating in the Asia-Pacific region for over 25 years and has since grown have almost 3,100 staff across eight cities. Its first Australian office opened in 1986 and it now has some 700 financial services professionals in the country.