Steward Partners Grabs 5 Advisors With $491M
East Coast advisors from Morgan Stanley, Wells Fargo and other firms are joining the Raymond James affiliate.
Steward Partners Global Advisory has recruited five advisors with a total of $491 million in client assets. The employee-owned independent partnership, which is associated with Raymond James, also opened an office in Conshohocken, Pennsylvania, near Philadelphia.
Coming on board are:
- Jason Hevey, previously with Morgan Stanley Smith Barney in Boston ($123 million);
- Ed Morenz from Edward Jones in Keene, New Hampshire ($150 million);
- Kevin Dubner from Janney Montgomery Scott in Albany, New York ($75 million); and
- Dean Rosini and Jeffrey Lazarus from Wells Fargo in the greater Philadelphia area ($143 million).
Hevey joined Steward Partners as a director after nearly 20 years of experience with Smith Barney (first owned by Citigroup and later Morgan Stanley).
“Smith Barney was all about the client. As the culture changed a bit, I went looking for the next Smith Barney,” Hevey said in an interview.
Steward Partners CEO James Gold “and I go back many years,” he added, “so Steward feels like a family. I want what’s good for my clients and for myself as I continue growing.”
The Scene at Steward
The firm has some 140 advisors, most of whom are employees.
“All of our advisors are doing remote work via Zoom” and other technology, said Doug Kentfield, head of wealth management at Steward Partners. “Advisors like Jason might not have that flexibility with the wirehouses.”
Hevey agrees. “I have close friends who went independent and with things like blogs, I could never do that as I wanted to earlier,” he added.
“Along with other communications, it’s another arrow in the quiver for me,” the advisor said. “Especially in the pandemic, with no travel and shaking hands, having other ways to stay in front of clients is huge. It’s another reason I made the choice I did.”
Hevey says he started thinking about leaving the wirehouse environment about four years ago. He took his time, because he wanted to be sure he was making the right “long-term choice.”
Steward Partners is glad he did. “Over the past three months, we’ve had a record quarter for advisors joining us,” Kentfield said. “There’s been a lot of interest from advisors on the East Coast, in Texas and other areas, so we see a strong 2021 ahead.”
— Check out Steward Adds $1.2B Team From Advisor Group on ThinkAdvisor.