Merrill vs. Morgan Stanley: Which Added More Assets, Advisors in Q3?
Though both posted somewhat mixed results, only one of the two firms posted strong asset flows in the quarter.
The third quarter included mixed results for two of the largest Wall Street firms — though one firm’s wealth unit clearly had stronger flows this period.
At the corporate level, Bank of America’s profits in the period ending Sept. 30 dropped 15% from a year ago to $4.9 billion, or $0.51 per share. Meanwhile, Morgan Stanley’s jumped 25% year over year to $2.72 billion, or $1.66 per share.
Financial Advisor Stats
Morgan Stanley’s tally is 15,469 advisors, up 70 from June 30, but down by 84 from a year ago. The registered reps work with a total of $2.85 trillion in client assets.
Related: BofA Launches Digital Financial Planning Tool
Advisors with Morgan Stanley have an average asset level of $184 million, and average trailing 12-month fees and commissions of $1.20 million as of Sept. 30.
Bank of America Merrill Lynch has 17,760 advisors, down by 128 from the prior quarter, but up 103 from last year; these figures include some advisors working on Merrill Edge and other BofA operations.
The overall wealth unit, which includes BofA Private Bank, has $3.07 trillion of client assets.
The BofA wealth unit’s advisors have average yearly production of $1.07 million; veteran advisors’ 12 month trailing fees and commissions were $1.46 million.
Wealth Unit Performance
The wealth unit of Morgan Stanley had revenues of about $4.66 billion in Q3, up 7% from $4.36 billion in the year-ago period. Its net income, though, dropped 12% year over year to $842 billion.
BofA’s wealth group had revenues of $4.55 billion in Q3 ($3.75 billion of which came from Merrill), down 7% from a year ago. Its profits fell by 32% from a year ago to $749 million.
As for net new assets, Morgan Stanley reported fee-based flows of $23.8 billion, while BofA’s wealth unit had $1.4 billion of net flows in overall assets under management.
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