Swimming against the flow of advisors leaving wirehouses, a three-person team formerly managing $12 billion at Stifel has moved to Morgan Stanley.
Ari Spar, Justin Bell and John Magovern have joined Morgan Stanley, forming a group called T6 Wealth Management. The team is joining Morgan Stanley's private wealth management unit and will operate out of the firm's new offices in a building at East 52nd Street in New York.
The recruiting deal was first reported by AdvisorHub. A Morgan Stanley spokesperson declined to comment on the move, and Stifel did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Spar joined Stifel in 2015 following its acquisition of the Barclays Capital brokerage. Before going to Barclays in 2009, he had been at Lehman Brothers for most of his 32-year career, according to BrokerCheck.
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Spar wrote on a website Stifel maintains for its offices at 3 Bryant Park in New York that, "At my previous firm, I used to spend 20% of each day dealing with bureaucracy. We don't have that at Stifel, meaning I've basically gained an extra day in each week that I can now spend serving and building relationships with my clients."
Bell started his career at JPMorgan in 2013 and moved to Barclays in 2015 just before its acquisition by Stifel. Magovern has 15 years of industry experience and started at Barclays in 2009.
The recruiting deal goes against the industry trend of advisors moving from large wirehouses to smaller regional or independent firms. Stifel reported in October that it had ended its quarter with 2,357 advisors, a net decline of 17.
Stifel has shown itself willing to go after large teams that have left in court. In early 2023, it sued a group of advisors managing roughly $10 billion in Indianapolis over allegations that it had "raided" its business in that area when they left to form a practice named Sapient Capital.
