By Matthias Rieker
Cantor Fitzgerald hired a veteran Merrill Lynch executive to
grow its fledgling wealth-advisory business.
Scott Hotham joined Cantor Fitzgerald Wealth Partners and will
report to Chief Executive Stan Gregor, the New York firm announced
Thursday. He will be responsible for expanding the infrastructure
of the firm's investment platform.
Cantor Fitzgerald, a longtime institutional broker, last year
started to offer wealth advice for individual investors, hoping to
tap into the trend of financial advisers leaving big wirehouses
like Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley (MS) to join independent
firms.
Merrill Lynch has shrunk from about 17,000 advisers in 2008 to
about 13,700 now. Bank of America Corp. (BAC) bought the brokerage
in January 2009.
"The opportunity for breakaway advisers was exciting six years
ago and it's no less exciting and no less of an opportunity today,"
Mr. Gregor told The Wall Street Journal in March.
In a news release, Mr. Gregor said: "We are assembling a top
notch team with tremendous talent." Hiring Mr. Hotham, he said,
will help Cantor Fitzgerald's effort to attract more successful
advisers.
Mr. Hotham in the same statement called Cantor Fitzgerald Wealth
Partners "the future of the wealth management business." He was the
head of institutional client solutions and strategy at Merrill
Lynch, where he worked for 24 years in various roles. He reported
to wealth-management chief, John Thiel, who promoted Mr. Hotham
after a leadership shakeup in 2011.
Mr. Hotham had previously served as the regional manager of the
South Atlantic region, where he oversaw 1,400 employees in 65
offices across six states, Cantor Fitzgerald said.
--Corrie Driebusch contributed to this article.
Write to Matthias Rieker at matthias.rieker@wsj.com
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