Displaying items by tag: recruiting

At Morgan Stanley’s annual US Financials, Payments & Commercial Real Estate conference, CEO James Gorman said that the bank is no longer relying on financial advisors recruiting for growth. 

Gorman sees future growth coming from the ‘funnels’ that Morgan Stanley has built which it sees as key to the next $1 trillion in assets it aims to bring over the next 3 years. After a fevered pace of advisor recruiting, the company is seeing minimal movement other than small teams coming and going. 

As part of the changing landscape, Morgan Stanley will only be recruiting high-quality teams with substantial assets. This does affect the marketplace given that Morgan Stanley has been one of the most aggressive in terms of recruiting over the past couple of years. 

Overall, the bank is moving towards a more holistic, comprehensive strategy when it comes to acquiring assets. In the first quarter, it added $110 billion in new assets. $28 billion came from workplace channels, $20 billion came from advisors hired away from struggling regional banks, and the majority of the remainder came from existing brokers. 

In the future, Gorman sees the workplace channel as being its most significant source of growth, especially given that the cost of luring advisors continues to increase. 

Finsum: Morgan Stanley has been a leader in advisor recruiting. But, this is changing as evidenced by CEO James Gorman’s recent comments.

For RIAIntel, Holly Deaton discussed the findings of a research study which showed that often advisors are getting in their own way when it comes to growing their practice and effectively serving their clients.

In 2022, about 20% of financial advisors saw a decline in assets under management according to a study from Janus Henderson. The research also showed that many advisors are not being aggressive enough when it comes to asking existing or potential clients for new business due to the fear of being seen as too pushy. 

However, advisors need to move past these fears if they want to successfully grow their business. And, most advisors struggle with adding new clients and growing assets under management. In contrast, successful firms have a culture of growth and consistently take proactive steps to ensure a robust pipeline of future clients. 

In addition to these factors holding back advisors, only 30% of advisors have a business plan in place, while only 25% have marketing material that is targeted towards their ideal client. This is despite 93% of advisors agreeing that a business and marketing plan are essential to growth. 

Overall, advisors need to do a better job of aligning their actions with their goals. And, the key to accomplish this is overcoming psychological hurdles of appearing too pushy and spending less time on client service and portfolio management.

Finsum: Many financial advisors are falling short of reaching their business goals due to some psychological hurdles. For instance, advisors agree that it’s important to have a business plan but only a minority actually do.

In an article for InvestmentNews, Bruce Kelley covers how Goldman Sachs and Citigroup are looking to bolster their wealth management divisions. In this sense, these banking giants are behind their peers like Morgan Stanley and UBS who have been quite aggressive in recruiting financial advisors.

Currently, these efforts consist of recruiting experienced advisors, training younger advisors, and acquisitions of thriving practices. One challenge for Citi and Goldman Sachs is that recruitment of advisors is quite competitive, leading to higher prices and more generous terms. Additionally, technology has also given more tools and capabilities to advisors, shrinking the gap between megabanks and smaller practice. 

Despite this, Wall Street banks continue to see wealth management as an area of growth. On a recent earnings call, Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser said, ““We see a lot of potential for growth in Asia as we fill in the coverage across the full wealth spectrum there. We will be scaling up in the U.S. by building out the investment offering and cross-selling into our existing and new clients across the country.”

Similarly, Goldman sees its future growth opportunities coming from hiring more advisors. It’s looking to add to its stable of 1,000 financial advisors for wealthy clients in the US and internationally.

Finsum: Advisor recruiting has been heating up over the past decade. Goldman Sachs and Citigroup have fallen behind their peers but are looking to increase their efforts in the coming quarters.

Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase C.E.O, has his eye on the road. Significantly down the road.

While he’s expected to outline his plans for the bank for years down the line, according to the New York Times, when it comes to the issue of who his successor will be, he’s likely to encounter questions anew.

While he’s not expected to climb down from the saddle anytime soon, the issue could rise to the surface among shareholders once again in light of succession plans at two rivals of JPMorgan. At Morgan Stanley, James Gorman recently announced he planned to step away within the next 12 months, while there are reports that Ken Jacobs, CEO of Lazard, is prepping to depart.

Meantime, whenever he decides the time’s right to hit the exit, Dimon will do so with considerably more than a gold watch. If he’s in his current position in 2026, he’ll pocket an additional $50 million payout, according to the site.  

Speaking of which, in terms of compensation changes around the big boys of broker-dealers – save for a few exceptions among some of the regional national firms – the year, it seems, is destined to be relatively quiet, according to financial-planning.com.

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In an article for GoBankingRates, Andrew Lisa shared some thoughts on the best way to onboard new clients. The first thing is to understand that a financial advisor needs to be an independent and trusted professional for the client, similar to a doctor or lawyer. 

While each individual client has unique personalities and circumstances, there are still some universal principles and guidelines that you can introduce to your clients. This will help communicate your philosophy and value proposition, while creating momentum towards your clients’ goals from Day 1. 

One suggestion is to start with understanding their cash flow. This means understanding every dollar that is coming in and going out. For every financial goal, this is the starting point. Additionally, you can get your clients started on tracking income and expenses to get a better understanding of cash flow. 

Related to this, the next step would be to establish clear goals for the short-term and long-term. The nature of goals could differ based on a clients’ circumstances and age. Finally to increase the odds of success, the plan needs to be put into writing. This increases the chances that the plan is followed and daily decisions are aligned with long-term goals. 

Finsum: Every client is unique, but there are still some common onboarding steps that advisors can take to introduce them to your practice and philosophy.