Priority Financial Group, a super office of supervisory jurisdiction with 25 advisors and $1.35 billion in client assets, has left LPL Financial for Securities America. The firm’s advisors work with 13 credit unions in Texas, Arizona and California.
The super OSJ is led by CEO Mike Prior, who said the team was attracted to Securities America’s flexibility, technology and wide range of investments at competitive pricing. They were also looking for a firm that works with financial institutions. Securities America works with over 125 credit unions and banks with over $4.2 billion in total assets under management.
In addition, at least two other IBD teams have left National Planning Holdings in the wake of the announcement it was acquired by LPL. That acquisition, and a change in how LPL will require advisors going forward park a portion of their fee-based accounts at LPL’s corporate RIA, have led some to speculate that smaller LPL teams will be swayed to go to other IBDs.
“One of the issues that hasn’t gotten much attention thus far is the fear that many LPL advisors and institutions have about whether service standards will be negatively impacted once LPL has brought on board the enormous volume of advisors and institutions that are joining the firm from the NPH acquisition,” said Jeff Nash, CEO of Bridgemark Strategies and a former senior in-house recruiter at LPL. “Viewed within this context, this transition could signal the start of a broader number of LPL advisors and institutions deciding to transition away because they don’t want to risk a ‘wait and see’ approach.”
Prior to the Priority Financial Group announcement, Jim Nagengast, the CEO of Securities America, spoke at the recent Wealthmanagement.com Executive Forum and said his firm was seeing a lot of opportunities to recruit teams in the wake of the LPL acquisition of NPH.
This week alone, two NPH-affiliated firms left for other b/ds rather than transition over to LPL: Paris International, a Great Neck, N.Y. $1.3 billion firm specializing in retirement plans for small businesses, departed for Commonwealth Financial, taking a shot at LPL in the process. “It’s a perfect fit for us—Commonwealth is a big firm that acts like a boutique. They have the scale we need to run our business while still offering personal support,” Michael Paris said in a statement.
Fond du Lac, Wis.-based Feucht Financial Group, which manages $435 million with seven advisors, left National Planning Corporation for Woodbury Financial Services, one of Advisor Group's independent b/ds.