People Moves
Summary Of Industry Moves In The Americas: June 2015
Here is a round-up of the senior moves covered by Family Wealth Report during the month of June 2015.
Bank of the West took on Steve Prostano to build out the firm's ultra high net worth business for individuals and families in the US with over $25 million in assets.
San Francisco, CA-based Prostano has around 30 years of experience designing, managing and growing businesses both in the US and abroad. Before joining Bank of the West, he was founder and managing partner at SPI Partners. He is also known for his stint as chief executive of Silver Bridge, which was acquired by Banyan Partners in 2013. Banyan Partners was in turn bought by Boston Private last year.
Family Wealth Advisors, a division of Bank of the West, will serve UHNW individuals, families, family offices, family foundations and non-profits, headed by Prostano.
Convergent Wealth Advisors, an independently operated affiliate of City National Bank, hired John Elmes as president. Elmes replaced Doug Wolford, who was appointed as CEO in 2014. His past experience includes senior roles at JP Morgan Private Bank, GenSpring Family Offices, Alex Brown and Arthur Andersen.
BNY Mellon hired Lillian Peters as a senior wealth director in Miami, FL. Peters, who reports to managing director Luis Castellanos, was formerly a regional director at SunTrust, where she was responsible for the firm's south and southwestern Florida wealth teams.
California-based Intellectus Partners, which concentrates on serving entrepreneurs, joined the Dynasty Financial Partners network. As well as investment management, wealth transfer, lending and philanthropy, Intellectus provides entrepreneurial advisory and venture services.
Prior to founding Intellectus Partners, David La Placa was a member of the client advisor executive committee and a managing director at Deutsche Bank Alex. Brown. Jay Casey, co-founder and president of Intellectus, is a former director, advisor and portfolio manager at Deutsche Bank. The pair have worked together since 2000 and were joined at Dynasty by Kelly Morton, vice president of client planning, and Tina Chan, vice president of operations and administration.
Andy Fent was appointed as a wealth management advisor at The Private Client Reserve of US Bank in Kansas City, MO. Fent previously worked at Commerce Trust, where he held roles including equity analyst, portfolio manager, market executive and director of relationship management.
Family Office Exchange, a global membership organization of enterprise families and their advisors, added two senior staff members in California to support its growing West Coast business. Karen Clark will be based in Santa Barbara as managing director of councils, and Linda Shepro will be based in San Diego as managing director of networks.
Clark joined FOX from Sandaire in London and in her new role will run several new peer councils, which bring together like-minded individuals for professional development and to focus on solving challenges they face in working with their families and their family offices. She joins Mariann Mihailidis and four other managers who run the current 13 FOX peer councils.
Meanwhile, Shepro joined from FDX Capital and will oversee the rollout of the six new FOX networks. Currently offered networks include: technology operations and data security; human capital; private family trust companies; and three investment networks: direct investing, strategic CIO, and endowment model investors. These were launched recently.
US Capital Advisors added a Houston, TX-based team, called Wealth Management Group, led by Kelly Rushing and also comprised of R Shawn Jones and Davis Rushing. The team – of which each member is latterly of UBS and was named as a managing director – includes Idania Reyes, a senior registered client service associate.
Don Braun was named director of Bernstein’s private wealth office in Philadelphia, PA, where he was previously a principal. Braun joined the firm in 2005 and was appointed as a principal in 2010. Earlier, he served for ten years as vice president of a privately-held family business at Greater Media.
Tampa, FL-based Independent Financial Partners, an RIA, hired Ned Van Riper as director of recruiting to expand its advisor network. Van Riper will identify not only wirehouse advisors looking to go independent, but also RIAs and fee-only advisors looking to “tuck in.” He started his career in 1999 as a financial advisor at Morgan Stanley and then moved to Smith Barney. In 2007, he transitioned to advisor recruiting, working as an external recruiter for LPL Financial before becoming an external recruiting consultant at Finetooth Consulting.
Continuing its wealth management drive, Robertson Stephens Advisors named Bruce Arella as president of the East Coast and Midwest regions; a member of the executive and investment policy committees; and director of real estate at Robertson Stephens Partners.
Arella will grow the firm’s recently launched Boston, MA, office and work to establish regional offices in key cities such as New York, Miami, FL, and Chicago, IL.
Before joining Robertson Stephens, Arella was a partner and head of real estate at We Family Offices, having previously been a partner and president of GenSpring's New York office. He also founded Ardent Fund Management, an equity long/short hedge fund, and was managing director and director of manager research at Orion Capital Management. Arella started his career at Standard & Poor's Securities.
US Bank named Jenna Guenther as a managing director of wealth strategy at Ascent Private Capital Management, its ultra high net worth business, in Denver, CO. Guenther previously served as a director of wealth planning with Ascent’s Center for Wealth Impact Planning - a role in which she focused on multi-generational and business succession planning, risk management, family governance and education, and other wealth planning services.
RBC Wealth Management recruited The Koeckert Anger Group from Merrill Lynch in Stamford, CT. Comprised of Dodd Newton Koeckert and Nicholas Anger, the team has $1.2 billion in assets under administration. Koeckert brought 31 years of industry experience to the firm, while Anger joined with 11. Also included are senior registered client associates Carolyn Valvano and Pamela Kamen.
HSBC Bank USA appointed Pablo Sanchez as head of retail banking and wealth management, succeeding Kevin Newman, who retired after 25 years at the firm. Sanchez will be based in New York City and lead the US business that also includes mortgage and insurance, with oversight responsibility for the same business in Canada.
The international law firm McDermott Will & Emery recruited Ellen Harrison as a partner in its Washington, DC, private client practice. Harrison was previously a partner at the law firm Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman.
The addition of Harrison advanced McDermott’s strategic focus on expanding its private client practice in Washington, DC, which was established this year when Leigh-Alexandra Basha joined the firm.
As well as Basha, Jean-Marc Tirard, David Adler and Nicholas Holland recently joined as private client partners in London. The new Washington private client practice will work with other McDermott offices in the US and London to provide global advice to wealthy clients and family offices.
Harrison focuses her practice on tax issues including estate planning and administration, tax controversies, and US and international income, gift and estate tax planning. Her clients include high net worth individuals, businesses and charitable organizations. She also has a strong background in estate planning matters including drafting wills, trusts, powers of attorney, prenuptial agreements, buy-sell agreements, corporate documents, and family partnership agreements.
Thuyen Nguyen and Kevin Kraus joined Advisor Software as chief technology officer and vice president of product management, respectively, to help the firm “enter its next stage of growth.”
As CTO, Nguyen will oversee software engineering and define the technical architecture of the firm. Prior to joining Advisor Software, he was chief executive and CTO at Data Agent, a software provider in the private fund regulatory compliance space that was acquired in 2013.
Meanwhile, Kraus is tasked with expanding the firm's roster of wealth management software applications. He has over 20 years of financial services experience at Charles Schwab, having most recently been responsible for supporting the acquisition and growth strategy of the retail active trader client business.
RBC Wealth Management added two new financial advisors at its Easton, Baltimore, MD, office. Alex Fritzsche, first vice president and financial advisor, joined RBC from Merrill Lynch while Jennifer Edgell, vice president and financial advisor, joined from Wye Financial & Trust.
Fritzsche brought 14 years of industry experience to the firm, and Edgell joined with 11. They have a combined $185 million in assets under administration and approximately $1.3 million in production. Also joining with them was Karen Kruse, a client associate.
BNY Mellon hired David Walker as a wealth director for business development in Boston, MA. Walker has spent most of his career as an executive director and portfolio manager at Van Kampen Investments/Morgan Stanley. His past experience also includes serving as a financial advisor at UBS and as an analyst at Trillium Asset Management. In his new role at BNY Mellon, Walker will report to managing director Fred Young.
LPL Financial, the RIA custodian and broker-dealer giant, named Tom Gooley as managing director of service, trading and operations.
Gooley joined LPL from TIAA-CREF, where he was latterly senior managing director and chief risk officer of the retirement and individual financial services division. Before that, he was managing director and head of operations of Morgan Stanley's global wealth and asset management divisions. Earlier in his career, Gooley led equities and futures operations at Bank of America Securities after 12 years at Goldman Sachs.
In his new role at LPL, Gooley will be responsible for leading LPL's service, trading and operations organizations, while mitigating risk, increasing efficiency and improving the client experience. He will report to Mark Casady, LPL's chairman and chief executive, and will serve as a member of the firm's management committee.
NFP Advisor Services promoted its vice president and investment advisory compliance officer, Mike Pedlow, to chief compliance officer.
Jennette Schlinke took on the day-to-day investment advisory compliance functionality and Pedlow remains closely involved in all aspects of the compliance program, including investment advisory, going forward.
Pedlow has over 15 years of experience in the financial services industry and also serves as CCO of Washington Wealth Management, an affiliate of NFP Advisor Services and recruiting platform for advisors transitioning from wirehouses. Prior to joining NFP Advisor Services, he supervised the RIA compliance programs at Raymond James.
Highmount Capital, which serves private clients in the US and abroad, joined Brown Advisory, the global independent investment management firm.
All 34 Highmount Capital professionals will move to Brown Advisory and own equity in the firm – as do all 445 Brown Advisory colleagues – Brown Advisory said.
Highmount, with offices in New York, Boston and Amsterdam, has a strong background advising international private clients, which will complement Brown Advisory's growing private client business served by its London office, said Mike Hankin, president and chief executive.
Brown Advisory serves private and institutional clients in all 50 states and 34 countries, through offices in Baltimore, MD, Washington, DC, Boston, MA, New York, Wilmington, DE, Chapel Hill, NC, and London. Going forward, Highmount clients will be advised by their existing teams.
GenSpring Family Offices named Chris Walters as managing director for the western region. Walters will be based in Costa Mesa, CA, and oversee GenSpring’s Los Angeles and San Francisco family offices. He took over from Pat Soldano, who retired but has since taken on a consulting role with GenSpring.
He joined from Rabobank, where he was executive vice president leading private banking, personal trust, asset management, institutional trust, brokerage, insurance, financial planning and wealth management solutions.
Before that, Walters was executive vice president at Citizens Business Bank, where he created Citizens Trust. He has also held senior roles at national and international wealth management firms, including Atlantic Trust, Citi Bank and Mellon.
Pitcairn named Eric Gaul as chief financial officer, reporting to Leslie Voth, president and chief executive. He replaced William McCormick.
Gaul was most recently managing director of family office services, and will continue to lead this group. Going forward, Gaul will serve as a member of Pitcairn’s leadership team, operating committee, and investment policy committee. He will also continue working with the firm’s client service teams on various planning matters. Earlier during his career at Pitcairn, he served as wealth management project manager.
Michael Feldman was appointed as head of wealth markets at Union Bank, which includes the firm's private wealth management, wealth planning, trust and estate services, and brokerage and asset management units.
Feldman has held a number of leadership roles at Union Bank since joining the company in 2009, most recently as head of branch banking and private banking. He assumed the role in April, taking over the group from Dennis Mooradian, who retired on June 12, 2015.
Feldman is based in Irvine, CA, and reports to Tim Wennes, West Coast president and head of retail banking and wealth markets. Meanwhile, David Wines was named as president and CEO of HighMark Capital Management, the firm's asset management subsidiary. Wines will assume this expanded role while continuing as HighMark’s chief fixed income officer. He is based in San Francisco and reports to Feldman.
United Capital Financial Advisers, which describes itself as a financial life management firm, hired six from StanCorp Investment Advisers that brought with them over $574 million in assets under management and opened five new offices.
United Capital also acquired the assets of Hutchinson Financial of Little Rock, AR. Staff members including founder Eric Hutchinson - now managing director at United Capital - are all now employees at the firm.
Jennifer Lee joined US Trust as managing director and market executive for Metro New York, encompassing the five boroughs of New York City. This is a newly-structured role and she did not directly replace anyone.
Lee will lead 33 advisors and other key team members who work with the market’s 4000 clients. She most recently worked at Wells Fargo Private Bank, where she oversaw all client relationship management teams and business lines in New York City, Westchester County and Long Island.
Prior to joining Wells Fargo, Lee was a managing director at Lehman Brothers, where she held various senior leadership roles – most recently as the Northeast leader of wealth management for Neuberger Berman. She started her career at JP Morgan and has also worked for Goldman Sachs.
Kurt MacAlpine, former leader of McKinsey's North American asset management arm, joined the ETF/ETP sponsor and asset manager WisdomTree Investments as executive vice president and head of global distribution – a new role at the firm.
MacAlpine will oversee WisdomTree’s ETP sales and distribution initiatives globally and join WisdomTree’s executive management team. In his previous role at McKinsey & Company, he managed global consulting teams in the asset management and wealth management sectors on topics related to distribution, marketing, product development, international expansion, strategy and M&A. He has extensive experience working with domestic and foreign firms in North America, Asia and Europe.
Baird added ten wealth management professionals – including six financial advisors – and opened a new office in Wichita, KS. The group of advisors, all of whom are legacy A G Edwards advisors and most recently worked at Wells Fargo Advisors, collectively brough over 150 years of combined industry experience and oversees more than $1.1 billion in client assets.
They are: Don Barry, managing director; The Docking Group, consisting of Jill Docking, senior vice president, and Brian Docking, senior vice president; Phillip Garrison, director; Kevin McWhorter, senior vice president; and Suzanne Marshall, vice president.
Jill and Brian Docking will be assisted by senior client specialist Jacqueline Stanton, and joining Barry were client specialists Janice Bosch and Charity Davis (Davis will also support Marshall and McWhorter). Garrison was joined by client specialist Brooklyn Young.
Northern Trust named Robert Lawson as Minnesota state president, reporting to region president, Mac MacLellan. Lawson was previously a senior vice president and managing director at the Private Client Reserve of US Bank in Minneapolis, MN. Before that, he was a vice president and head of financial and estate planning at US Trust in Minneapolis.
BNY Mellon appointed Alan Flanagan to the new role of global head of private equity and real estate fund services. Flanagan will continue to be based in Dublin and report to Frank La Salla, chief executive of BNY Mellon's Alternative Investment Services business in New York.
As a new unit within AIS, PE&RE Fund Services will include over $100 billion in assets under administration and over 150 employees globally. Most recently, Flanagan was global head of product management for AIS, and will be succeeded in this role by Robert Chambers, who joins BNY Mellon from Balestra Capital.
Flanagan joined BNY Mellon in 2007 from UBS Fund Services (Cayman), where he was head of business development-Americas. In February, BNY Mellon and Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management announced an agreement through which Deutsche will outsource its real estate and infrastructure fund accounting, and parts of its reporting functions, to BNY Mellon.
UBS appointed Mary Rozell as the new global head of its art collection business. Rozell will join Zurich-based UBS Art Collection after six years of serving as director of the art business program at Sotheby’s Institute of Art in New York. She is also a private art collection consultant.
Rozell will replace Irene Zortea, who will retire at the end of September, to lead the global team of art experts. This includes Jacqueline Lewis, curator for the Americas, and Stephen McCoubrey, curator for the UK, Europe and Asia-Pacific. She will oversee acquisitions, exhibitions and the general management of the company's corporate collection.
Bryan Kirk was appointed as trust counsel of Fiduciary Trust International of California, based in San Mateo. Kirk joined Fiduciary Trust from San Francisco-based Botto Law Group, where he was a partner specializing in estate planning, trust and estate administration and tax exempt organizations. Before that, he was an associate at Anderson, Zeigler, Disharoon, Gallagher and Gray, the law firm.
Northern Trust recruited Paul Lee from AB Bernstein Private Wealth Management for a top post within its wealth advisory services group in New York.
In his previous role at Bernstein, Lee was national managing director of the wealth management and global family office group, also based in New York. It is unclear when it was that he left this role and if a successor has yet been named; the firm declined to comment when contacted by Family Wealth Report.
Lee was named as a senior vice president and senior regional wealth advisor - a new role - reporting to John Hoffman, head of Northern Trust Wealth Management’s greater New York region. He has over 20 years of tax, estate planning and investment experience in the US and UK.
Earlier at Bernstein, he opened the firm’s first non-US private client office, in London. As managing director of the London private client sales group, he put in place the investment infrastructure for all of the firm's non-US private clients. Lee began his career practicing law at various firms, eventually becoming a partner in the tax, estate planning and wealth protection group at Smith, Gambrell & Russell.
City National Bank, the US private and business bank, hired three wealth advisors to reinforce its East Coast business. Anthony Savino joined as a senior vice president and senior private banker from Morgan Stanley; Alan Wolberg joined as a senior vice president and senior wealth planner from Bank of America Merrill Lynch; Carolyn Finer joined as a private investment consultant from UBS Financial Services.
Wealth Access, the high net worth financial management platform, hired seven senior technology and financial services veterans, while also reporting strong year-on-year growth.
The firm said it now reports on over $20 billion - a 350 per cent increase year-over-year - and has logged a 1,437 per cent growth - a 14-fold increase - in active users during this time.
The following joined Wealth Access: Doug McPhail, director of sales engineering; Paul Polese, vice president of business development; Ellen Smith, vice president of sales; Will Cooper, vice president of operations and client service; Brian Semitekol, chief financial officer; Jeff Norris, senior user experience architect; and Kanchana Chalia, senior software engineer.
McPhail previously held senior roles at Charles Schwab and Black Diamond; Polese was director of investment advisory solutions at Envestnet – Placemark; Smith is latterly of eMoney Advisor; Cooper joined from Black Diamond; Semitekol previously worked at Shareholder Insite (now Ipreo); Norris is previously of Underwrites Laboratory; and Chalia joined from Symantec.
BNY Mellon recruited Elaine Leach for a newly-created wealth director role, and hired Ryan Mitchell as an associate portfolio manager, in San Diego, CA. The firm also promoted Jeremy Kovacs to senior portfolio manager in San Diego. All three report to regional managing director, Paul Thiel.
The additions to the San Diego office, which opened in December of 2013, were part of the firm’s strategic hiring initiative in key wealth markets. Since establishing its San Diego County presence, BNY Mellon has increased its assets there by 300 per cent and its staff size by 50 per cent, it said.
Leach replaced Thiel in his former role in San Diego - subsequent to his recent promotion to managing director. Before joining BNY Mellon, she served as business development manager at TAG Family CFO Services.
Mitchell was previously an alternative investment consultant in the private client group of Altegris Investments, and, before that, held a similar role at Triton Capital Advisors. Earlier in his career at BNY Mellon Wealth Management, Kovacs was a portfolio manager, responsible for private client and foundation assets. Earlier, he was an investment management specialist at Wells Fargo.
Bel Air Investment Advisors brought in Supriya Batra and Stephanie Withers - both from JP Morgan Private Bank - as advisors and senior vice presidents at its recently-established San Francisco, CA, office.
Batra was previously a client advisor at JP Morgan Private Bank and a managing director at Sterling Stamos. Before that, she was a vice president in the private wealth management group at Goldman Sachs. Withers also joined from JP Morgan Private Bank, where she was an executive director responsible for strategic asset allocation and investment solutions. Before her stint at JP Morgan, she spent seven years in the investment research department at Goldman Sachs. Earlier in her career, she was an associate at Cambridge Associates, and, earlier, an analyst at Robertson Stephens.
RBC Wealth Management hired Kurt Kharouf as a senior vice president and financial advisor in South Hills, Pittsburgh, PA. Kharouf joined from Merrill Lynch, with $117 million in assets under administration and $1.17 million in production. He brought with him Ginny Hoffman, a senior client associate.
Wilmington Trust hired Julie Barron as a senior private client advisor and Salma Haikal as a senior private banker in Boston, MA. Barron previously held senior roles at Fiduciary Trust and JP Morgan Private Bank in the ultra high net worth space. She was also a senior vice president at Brown Brothers Harriman.
In her new role at Wilmington Trust, Barron will work with high net worth individuals, families and business owners throughout New England. Haikal has nearly two decades of experience serving ultra high net worth families and their advisors. Before joining Wilmington Trust, she was a senior vice president at US Trust Private Wealth Management.
Webster Private Bank recruited Christopher O’Connell as senior vice president, senior private banker and regional market executive for Massachusetts and Rhode Island.
He will be based in Boston and report to Peter Gabriel, senior vice president and director of relationship management and sales. O'Connell joined Webster from Boston Private Bank and Trust Company, where he was senior vice president and manager of investment sales.
GenSpring Family Offices appointed Jim Brennan as managing director for the Florida-west region and David Herritt as managing director for the Northeast region.
Brennan, who has been with GenSpring for a decade, previously served as senior family wealth advisor to clients in Tampa Bay and Sarasota. In his new role, he will oversee activities in Orlando, Tampa Bay and Sarasota family offices.
Herritt has served as senior family wealth advisor at Genspring since 2006. He is also family governance director, helping clients in the development of their family policies and governance structures. In other movements, GenSpring's former managing director Pat Soldano returned in a consultancy capacity. She left the firm at the end of last year, having spent five years heading up its western region. Soldano helped develop Cymric Family Office Services into a multi-family office back in 1996 which became part of GenSpring in 2009.
Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management, part of Deutsche Bank, made additions to its team in Miami, FL. Oti Roberts joined Deutsche’s private bank as a managing director and senior private banker, along with senior investment advisor, Freddy Menjivar, and associate banker, Scott Shuffield. Roberts and his team are responsible for serving UHNW clients in the southeast region of the US. Roberts reports directly to Chip Packard, co-head of wealth management in the Americas.
Before joining Deutsche AWM, Roberts was a managing director and senior private banker for JP Morgan Private Bank, where he helped establish its first private banking office in Miami. He also served on JP Morgan’s 14-member private bank advisory council. Previously, Roberts spent five years with Bank of America in Miami.
Menjivar joined as a director and senior investment advisor. Prior to Deutsche AWM, he was an executive director at JP Morgan Private Bank, where he led the investment practice in South Florida. He began his career in its Palm Beach office in 2000. Shuffield joined as an associate banker. Previously, he was an analyst for JP Morgan Private Bank in Miami.
Illinois-based First Midwest Bank appointed Paul Hoefert as senior vice president and head of private banking. Hoefert most recently served as chief administrative officer at Northern Trust's wealth management unit, where he managed client services. He has 37 years of experience in the banking and wealth management industries. In his new role, he will oversee the bank's business catering to the needs of high net worth clients.
Atlantic Trust, the US private wealth management division of CIBC, added to its teams to drive growth in its Texas and California offices. John Winslow joined the firm as senior relationship manager and managing director, overseeing the Dallas and Austin regions. Prior to joining Atlantic Trust, he was a senior director for BNY Mellon.
J Bradford Craig joined the firm’s San Francisco office as senior relationship manager and senior vice president. Craig brought with him more than 37 years of industry experience to the firm. In his new role, he consults with clients and their advisors to develop and implement customized investment allocation strategies. Prior to joining Atlantic Trust, Craig was a senior investment strategist for nine years at Wells Fargo Private Bank, where he also consulted with high net worth individuals and foundations.
Mark Frazier, senior relationship manager, will support Winslow in Texas, and was appointed head of the Austin office and promoted to managing director.
In the firm’s Houston office, F Allen Lyons, vice president, transitioned from his role as wealth strategist to serve as a business development professional in the region. Lyons joined Atlantic Trust in 2008 as a wealth strategist, providing clients with estate and financial planning services. In his new role as business development officer, he will be responsible for cultivating relationships with high net worth clients and strengthening associations with key intermediary referral sources. Prior to joining Atlantic Trust, Lyons was a tax and audit associate at Stevens, Henry & Mathews.
The executive search firm Sheffield Haworth hired Andrew Blane as managing director of its asset management practice in New York. Blane joined from Warren International, an executive search boutique specializing in conducting team lift-outs and searches in asset management. There he served as managing director, identifying and placing entire teams of asset managers. He also advises chief executives of investment management firms on all aspects of their firm’s global expansion.
The international law firm Withers opened new offices on the West Coast and added nine partners, and a further 17 fee-earners to its ranks in what it described as “dramatic US expansion”. The new offices are in San Diego, Los Angeles and Rancho Santa Fe.
Most of the new team joined Withers from the private client services group at McKenna Long & Aldridge, with lawyers specializing in areas such as trusts, estate planning, charitable giving and estate litigation. It also appointed litigation partner Michael Brophy, joining from Russ August & Kabat, and counsel Christine Steiner, who joined the firm from Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton. The extended California team joined Withers shortly after the arrival of five corporate, litigation and IP partners from Kelley Drye & Warren LLP, who are based in Connecticut.
