LPL Trims CEO's 2020 Compensation

LPL Financial cut the total compensation of CEO and President Dan Arnold in 2020 to $7.3 million from $7.7 million in 2019, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday.

Arnold's base salary was unchanged at $850,000, LPL said in the filing. However, his salary came in at slightly less than that for 2019, at $842,308, because he received a base salary increase from $800,000 to $850,000 on Feb. 17, 2019.

Arnold did not receive option awards in 2020. In 2019, he earned option awards of $1.7 million, up from $1.5 million in 2018.

In 2020, Arnold also received $4.2 million in stock awards, up from $2.6 million in 2019; non-equity incentive plan compensation of $2.2 million, down from $2.5 million in 2019; and other compensation of $36,170, down from $44,630.

Meanwhile, the base salary of Matthew Audette, LPL's chief financial officer, remained $600,000 last year, but his total compensation decreased to $2.8 million from $3.3 million.

The base salaries of Scott Seese, chief information officer and managing director, and Dayton Semerjian, chief customer care officer and managing director, each remained $500,000.

But Seese's total compensation decreased to $2.4 million from $2.8 million, while Semerjian's total compensation decreased to $2.3 million from $2.4 million.

The only LPL executive whose base salary increased last year was Richard Steinmeier, divisional president and managing director, to $500,000 from $450,000. His total 2020 compensation increased to $2.4 million from $2.2 million.

In determining the salaries of Arnold, Audette, Seese and Semerjian, the LPL Compensation Committee "considered, among other things, the competitiveness and mix of each executive's total compensation opportunity based on benchmarking data prepared by the Compensation Consultant," the company said in the filing.

That data included compensation data for "comparable roles at relevant peer companies and other survey data," it noted.

In increasing Steinmeier's base salary, the Compensation Committee "considered his role, the scope of which had expanded to include responsibility for corporate strategy, his individual performance and his enterprise-wide contribution to" LPL's performance, as well as benchmarking data and internal equity considerations, it said.

2020 Performance

The firm's net income for the full year 2020 was $472.64 million, down 16% from $559.88 million in 2019. Full-year earnings per share last year were $5.86, down 11% form the prior year's $6.62.

Gross profits weakened 3% to $2.10 billion in '20 from $2.17 billion in '19, while earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization rose 20% to $1.036 billion in 2020 from $866 million in 2019.

The number of advisors affiliated with LPL at the end of 2020 was 17,287 vs. 16,464 a year earlier. They worked with total assets of $903 billion as of Dec. 31, 2020, up from $764 billion as of Dec. 31, 2019.

LPL Adds Another Advisor Team

LPL's advisor count continues to grow in 2021. Scottsdale, Arizona-based Progressive Financial Concepts has joined LPL's broker-dealer, corporate RIA and custodial platforms, aligned with The Wealth Consulting Group (WCG), a large enterprise supporting LPL advisors, LPL announced Wednesday.

The Progressive team served about $450 million in advisory, brokerage and retirement plan assets, and join LPL from Advisor Group's Sagepoint Financial, LPL said. Advisor Group did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Progressive team of financial advisors includes Kory Budinger, Michael Apsell, Eric Black, Greg Morell, Stan Waldrop and Brian West. They have worked together for over 20 years, "taking an integrated team approach to provide multigenerational wealth management and retirement planning for closely held businesses and individuals," LPL said. The team is supported by five administrative staff members.

The team turned to LPL and WCG for "enhanced technology and differentiated service experiences," LPL said.

"Since we share client relationships across our team, we needed a partner like LPL that makes significant investments in integrated capabilities that allow us to easily access the latest customer information," according to Budinger.

With the LPL ClientWorks platform, "which is in sync with DocuSign and our CRM software, we have access to a broad range of tools designed to help us give our clients a service experience that we believe they can't find anywhere else," he said in the announcement.

He called LPL's client-facing technology a "game changer," adding: "We've also known the team at WCG for a long time and believe that their support will help us deliver a very comprehensive wealth management service for our clients."