FINRA Bars Ex-Merrill Rep Who Refused to Cooperate With Probe

Merrill Lynch declined to comment Friday. Ianace did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

After leaving Merrill Lynch, Ianace went to work for another FINRA member firm from December 2019 through May, when that company terminated him. FINRA did not identify the second firm in the letter. However, FINRA's BrokerCheck website identifies it as Wells Fargo.

Neither the letter nor BrokerCheck specified why he left Wells Fargo, who declined to comment.

There was a customer dispute involving Ianace while he was with Wells Fargo in which the claimants alleged their advisors at the firm "made unsuitable recommendations and neglected to reduce the over-concentrated and over-leveraged nature of their accounts," according to a disclosure on his report. The claimants are seeking in excess of $13 million, according to the more detailed FINRA report on the BrokerCheck site. That complaint is still pending.

Ianace is no longer a registered broker or RIA, according to BrokerCheck. He has been serving as chief operating officer for VitalTech Innovations, a remote patient monitoring and digital health company in Plano, Texas, since June 2019, according to his LinkedIn profile.