With the planned purchase of three Pacific Life broker dealers with 2,200 advisors, LPL is on track to include more than 10,000 FAs. To better serve its expanding FA force, the independent broker-dealer says it's hired a chief market strategist, Jeffrey Kleintop, 37. He'll support the efforts of Chief Investment Officer Lincoln Anderson and LPL's research team, which includes more than 25 staff members and is based in Boston.
"Today, financial advisors do about 80-90 percent of their work on performance management of portfolios for clients," says Bill Dwyer, managing director of national sales for LPL, headquartered in San Diego. "Today's clients want broad-based support, traditional and non-traditional. So advisors need to outsource all they can, including research."
That means LPL's research team has a lot on its plate. "We're the largest independent research firm without proprietary products," explains Dwyer. "And roughly 60 cents out of every dollar our advisors have under management in advisory accounts tracks one of our model portfolio recommendations, which consist of ETFs, separately managed accounts and mutual funds, not specific equities."
Kleintop, previously the chief investment strategist and senior vice president at PNC Wealth Management and Institutional Investment of Pittsburgh, has helped guide the investment strategy of about $50 billion in assets. At LPL, current assets under management stand about three times that level.
"We're very excited to add someone with Jeff's extensive investment management expertise to the LPL research team," says Anderson.
"I look at LPL as an opportunity to leverage new solutions and strategies for a growing asset base managed by some 10,000 financial advisors. LPL advisors crave research, and their portfolio of tools has really blossomed. Still, this can be overwhelming, and advisors need to partner with a trusted source of investment advice."
