Bank of America headquarters in Charlotte, North Carolina. (Photo: AP)
Bank of America topped earnings estimates in the first quarter but fell slightly short on revenue. Its wealth management business saw profits rise and — unlike rival Wells Fargo — is not seeking to get rid of its retirement-plan operations.
For the first quarter, the bank boosted net income 6% to $7.3 billion, or $0.70 per share, from $6.9 billion, or $0.62 per share, a year ago thanks to loan growth and lower expenses. Revenue, net of interest expense, was $23 billion vs. $23.1 billion a year ago.
Its Global Wealth & Investment Management unit improved net income 14% from last year to $1.05 billion. Revenue for the group, which includes Merrill Lynch, weakened about 1% to $4.82 billion.
On an earnings call with reporters, a senior executive of the wealth unit who asked not to be named said the institutional retirement business generates and benefits from "lots of referrals" in other parts of the bank. "We see tremendous opportunity to continue driving growth around institutional retirement," he said.
Client Balances, Advisor Headcount
The unit's total client balances rose $111 billion, or 4% from last year, to $2.84 trillion. GWIM had a pretax margin of 29%, up from 26% a year ago but down from 30% in the fourth quarter of 2018.
While the full unit has about 17,534 financial advisors, the number for Merrill Lynch is 14,761 — down eight from the prior quarter and 68 from a year ago. The group's attrition rate stands at about 3%, the executive says.
Average yearly fees and commissions for the quarter across the GWIM unit are $1.039 million vs. $1.046 million in the fourth quarter and $1.038 million a year ago. Among veteran Merrill FAs, this figure is about $1.350 million as of the first quarter.
Growth Drivers
Merrill advisors added a gross 17,625 new relationships in the quarter, up 41% from a year ago; this represents an average of 1.2 new client households per advisor in the quarter.
"On an annualized basis for experienced advisors, this could mean six gross relationships each in 2019," according to the executive. These new clients brought in about $17.5 billion in assets.
