Cetera Adds $2.4B RIA From MassMutual

By Jeff Berman

News May 10, 2021 at 09:59 PM

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The latest advisor team to join Cetera Financial Group's network as an affiliate of Cetera Advisors is based in Texas and supports $2.4 billion in wealth management assets, Cetera said Wednesday.

The newly launched RIA Totus Wealth Management has offices in Houston and the Woodlands, and plans to expand, according to Cetera.

Totus is led by James Starnes, its CEO and president, and offers full-service financial planning, a complete suite of wealth management services and a variety of insurance and protection products.

Prior to affiliating with Cetera, Starnes had been a registered broker and advisor with broker-dealer MassMutual (MML) Investors Services since 2017, according to his report on the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority's BrokerCheck website. Over his 20 years in the sector, he has been registered with FINRA through five other firms, including UBS from 2010 to 2014 and Morgan Stanley Smith Barney from 2009 to 2010, according to BrokerCheck.

The diverse Totus team is made up of individuals with more than 60 years of combined experience, according to Starnes.

"We take what we call a unique 'Experts Together' approach focusing on financial solutions and life's planned and unplanned events," he said in a statement. "Cetera allows us to expand our vision and better serve multi-generational clients across a larger geographic footprint."

Totus, the Latin word for "the whole or total," inspires both the name and the firm's approach to client service, according to Cetera. Joining Starnes is a team of six producing financial professionals and four support staff with plans for immediate growth.

Cetera, which has more than 8,000 advisors managing assets of $260 billion, continues to actively recruit advisors and other financial professionals, it said. The company noted in March that it continued its recruiting momentum in February with the addition of several new affiliates and $1.7 billion in new assets.

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