An ex-wirehouse team managing billions in client assets became the latest breakaway opting to launch an RIA after considering their options during the pandemic.
Financial advisors Scott Bills, Brett Bills, Teresa Friess, Aaron Seeman and Joshua DeLoach opened Nilsine Partners on the Dynasty Financial Partners platform after leaving Merrill Lynch, the firm
So far this year, the Dynasty network has added four new RIAs and a half dozen other practices that folded into existing firms on the platform. Remote work during the coronavirus is prompting even more wirehouse teams than the substantial exits of earlier years to consider Dynasty or breakaway competitors such as Sanctuary Wealth and Focus Financial Partners, according to recruiter Frank LaRosa of Elite Consulting Partners.
“They've effectively been working as independent advisors the whole time and just not getting paid that way,” LaRosa said, pointing out that the wirehouses’ own strategies “pushing their advisor workforce” to convert client accounts from the brokerage to the advisory side are likely adding to their retention difficulties. “Now they have these teams that are 90%, 95% advisory, and all of a sudden going to an RIA or becoming an RIA is more feasible.”
Representatives for Merrill Lynch declined to comment on the team’s departure.
The practice spent most of the past two years in due diligence, meeting with more than 10 other potential suitors over that span, Scott Bills said in an interview. The Greenwood Village, Colorado-based team picked Charles Schwab as its custodian, and two of the advisors affiliated with Purshe Kaplan Sterling Investments as their broker-dealer in order to service the few brokerage products held by a couple of the households in its client base, he said. Nilsine plans to use capital from Dynasty Advisors Financing Services to expand through recruiting and M&A.
“The pandemic really gave us the time to sit back and analyze the future of the business, what our clients are asking for and where we see the opportunities,” Bills said. “The trajectory and growth of their business really mirrored the trajectory and growth of our business....I don't know how anyone would do this without someone like a Dynasty.”
With the launch of the new RIA, the client assets on Dynasty’s platform have topped $64 billion, with an average incoming team size this year of $470 million, according to the firm. The network added two other billion-dollar teams from
“A team with the caliber of Nilsine Partners moving to a fully independent RIA model is further evidence of the ongoing movement of experienced advisors choosing the option they feel is best for their clients, their team, and their families,” Dynasty CEO Shirl Penney said in a statement.
