HighTower’s Pagnato-Karp Group Lands Former Merrill Lynch Advisor

HighTower, the advisor-owned financial services firm, announced on Thursday that David Nelson has joined its Pagnato-Karp Group, based in Washington, D.C., as a private wealth advisor. Nelson, most recently a financial advisor at Merrill Lynch, began his new role at HighTower October 5.

“David’s experience and commitment to acting in the best interests of his clients makes him the ideal fit for HighTower,” Paul Pagnato, partner and managing director at HighTower, said in a statement. “Our partnership is built on restoring the fiduciary relationship between advisors and clients and leveraging the competitive power of Wall Street to ensure that it benefits our clients.”

According to Pagnato, Nelson was a key member of Merrill Lynch’s Global Wealth Management Group in Washington over the last decade, specializing in financial planning, portfolio design, and investment management for ultra-high-net-worth families and institutional clients. Earlier in his career, he represented Bank of America in its key correspondent relationships with money center and regional banks in New York and the northeastern U.S. Nelson began his financial services career at Merrill Lynch Capital Markets in 1986.