HOUSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 30, 2025--
Americana Partners announced today that Mark Monroe has joined the firm as Senior Vice President, Private Wealth Advisor.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250630362331/en/
Based in the firm’s Houston office, Monroe managed over $1 billion in AUM (as of June 16, 2025) and has over 15 years of deep expertise implementing complex investment strategies and delivering premium client service to family offices, sophisticated investors, and other ultra-high-net-worth individuals. Monroe will further broaden his core business with concierge financial services, customized investment strategies, and trust and estate planning support for Americana’s ultra-high-net-worth clients.
“We are thrilled to welcome Mark Monroe to Americana Partners,” said Ron Thacker, Americana’s President. “His integrity, investment experience, and unwavering commitment to clients make him an exceptional addition to our team. Mark’s decision to join us underscores our shared vision of delivering independent, high-touch advice to successful families and institutions.”
Most recently, Monroe served as a Senior Vice President and Director of Alternative Investments at Morgan Stanley. Prior to that, he established the Houston office of Cornerstone Global Commodities in 2013 and specialized in executing sensitive derivatives trades for hedge funds and investment banks.
“I am excited to be joining Americana Partners, where the culture of entrepreneurship, outstanding technology, and mix of corporate partners will allow me to truly put clients first,” said Mr. Monroe. “I look forward to having the flexibility to anticipate and serve client needs in the continually evolving wealth management landscape.”
“Mark brings a wealth of knowledge, fresh perspective, and a stellar reputation among ultra-high-net-worth families and institutions across Texas and beyond, and we are excited to have him join the Americana Partners team,” added Jason Fertitta, CEO of Americana.
About Americana Partners
Founded in 2019 and headquartered in Houston, Americana Partners is an independent wealth advisory firm working with a select network of families and individuals to help them simplify the management of their wealth. The firm offers wealth advisory and family office services, including alternative and traditional investment solutions. Americana serves high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth clients across the United States, with a division serving ultra-high-net-worth Latin American clients. The company celebrated its six-year anniversary in April 2025, having grown rapidly since its launch in 2019 to now manage over $10 billion in assets. Free from most of the constraints of corporate ownership, Americana is empowered to leverage support from Dynasty Financial Partners and other industry experts.
To learn more, visit www.americanapartners.com. Follow along on LinkedIn, Instagram, or Facebook.
Mark Monroe, Americana Partners Senior Vice President / Private Wealth Advisor
JERUSALEM (AP) — Over two dozen families from one of the few remaining Palestinian Bedouin villages in the central West Bank have packed up and fled their homes in recent days, saying harassment by Jewish settlers living in unauthorized outposts nearby has grown unbearable.
The village, Ras Ein el-Auja, was originally home to some 700 people from more than 100 families that have lived there for decades.
Twenty-six families already left on Thursday, scattering across the territory in search of safer ground, say rights groups. Several other families were packing up and leaving on Sunday.
“We have been suffering greatly from the settlers. Every day, they come on foot, or on tractors, or on horseback with their sheep into our homes. They enter people’s homes daily,” said Nayef Zayed, a resident, as neighbors took down sheep pens and tin structures.
Israel's military and the local settler governing body in the area did not respond to requests for comment.
Other residents pledged to stay put for the time being. That makes them some of the last Palestinians left in the area, said Sarit Michaeli, international director at B’Tselem, an Israeli rights group helping the residents.
She said that mounting settler violence has already emptied neighboring Palestinian hamlets in the dusty corridor of land stretching from Ramallah in the West to Jericho, along the Jordanian border, in the east.
The area is part of the 60% of the West Bank that has remained under full Israeli control under interim peace accords signed in the 1990s. Since the war between Israel and Hamas erupted in October 2023, over 2,000 Palestinians — at least 44 entire communities — have been expelled by settler violence in the area, B'Tselem says.
The turning point for the village came in December, when settlers put up an outpost about 50 meters (yards) from Palestinian homes on the northwestern flank of the village, said Michaeli and Sam Stein, an activist who has been living in the village for a month.
Settlers strolled easily through the village at night. Sheep and laundry went missing. International activists had to begin escorting children to school to keep them safe.
“The settlers attack us day and night, they have displaced us, they harass us in every way” said Eyad Isaac, another resident. “They intimidate the children and women.”
Michaeli said she’s witnessed settlers walk around the village at night, going into homes to film women and children and tampering with the village’s electricity.
The residents said they call the police frequently to ask for help — but it seldom arrives. Settlement expansion has been promoted by successive Israeli governments over nearly six decades. But Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right government, which has placed settler leaders in senior positions, has made it a top priority.
That growth has been accompanied by a spike in settler violence, much of it carried out by residents of unauthorized outposts. These outposts often begin with small farms or shepherding that are used to seize land, say Palestinians and anti-settlement activists. United Nations officials warn the trend is changing the map of the West Bank, entrenching Israeli presence in the area.
Some 500,000 Israelis have settled in the West Bank since Israel captured the territory, along with east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, in the 1967 Mideast war. Their presence is viewed by most of the international community as illegal and a major obstacle to peace. The Palestinians seek all three areas for a future state.
For now, displaced families of the village have dispersed between other villages near the city of Jericho and near Hebron further south, said residents. Some sold their sheep and are trying to move into the cities.
Others are just dismantling their structures without knowing where to go.
"Where will we go? There’s nowhere. We’re scattered,” said Zayed, the resident, “People’s situation is bad. Very bad.”
An Israeli settler herds his flock near his outpost beside the Palestinian village of Ras Ein al-Auja in the West Bank, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
A Palestinian resident of Ras Ein al-Auja village, West Bank burns trash, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
Palestinian children play in the West Bank village of Ras Ein al-Auja, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
Palestinian residents of Ras Ein al-Auja village, West Bank pack up their belongings and prepare to leave their homes after deciding to flee mounting settler violence, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
Palestinian residents of Ras Ein al-Auja village, West Bank pack up their belongings and prepare to leave their homes after deciding to flee mounting settler violence, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
