Morgan Stanley Adds 9 Merrill, Wells & JPMorgan Advisors

William Seabrook and Kathleen Chiappone joined Morgan Stanley in Orlando from Wells Fargo. The team now reports to branch manager Derek Tangeman. Its combined production is roughly $1.8 million.

Coming over from JPMorgan are Paul D. Emrick, Troy Hottenstein and Scott Holland. They are now reporting to complex manager Rick Frick in downtown Philadelphia. The team's total yearly fees and commissions are $3.7 million, and its prior assets are $400 million.

In the fourth quarter, Morgan Stanley said it had 16,780 advisors, down 29 reps from the prior quarter and off 4% from last year's tally of 17,512. Average annualized revenue per rep, though, was $824,000, an improvement of 4% from the prior quarter and 13% from last year.

"Morgan Stanley may have its technology challenges, but the fact is that it has a broad-based platform of fee-based services and a pretty hefty recruiting war chest," said Mark Elweig, head of the executive-search consulting group Mark Elzweig Company in New York, in an interview last week, with AdvisorOne. "Also, advisors who like the wirehouse model have only one of four firms from which to choose. Depending upon where they've worked before, the actual number of choices is even fewer" still.