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Raymond James' headquarters in St. Petersburg, Florida

Industry Spotlight > Broker Dealers

Raymond James, Dynasty, Concurrent Brace for Hurricane Ian

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What You Need to Know

  • The firms closed their offices in Central Florida to prepare for the hurricane.

Financial services firms based in Central Florida have spent recent days preparing for Hurricane Ian’s arrival, shutting down their offices and having advisors and other members of their staffs who live in especially vulnerable areas evacuate before the brunt of the storm arrived.

Raymond James’ home office in St. Petersburg, Florida, will be closed Wednesday and Thursday “in preparation for Hurricane Ian and to ensure the safety of our associates,” the firm said in a statement released Tuesday.

“We’ve enacted our business continuity and evacuation plans to ensure support for critical operations from our Memphis, Southfield, Mich. and Denver facilities,” Raymond James added.

On the same day that Raymond James and Concurrent Advisors, its affiliate based nearby in Tampa, Florida, said they split up and that Concurrent was restructuring its business as a multi-custodial, hybrid RIA, the companies were making similar plans to ready for Ian.

“Concurrent’s whole Tampa office was shut down and evacuated yesterday, which has impacted around 30 folks,” including co-founder Nate Lenz, who “evacuated his family including his newborn child,” a Concurrent spokesperson told ThinkAdvisor on Tuesday.

“Most of the impacted Concurrent team have been preparing for the hurricane for the past few days, and have evacuated from their homes. They expect to work remotely for the rest of the week,” the spokesperson added.

Dynasty Financial Partners, meanwhile, is “executing its business continuity plans and evacuating employees in vulnerable areas,” a spokesperson for that firm told ThinkAdvisor on Tuesday.

Dynasty said in February 2019 it was relocating its headquarters from New York to downtown St. Petersburg, about 12 miles south of Raymond James Financial’s headquarters, in the second quarter of that year.

“We have clients across the U.S. and there will be no disruption to service,” the Dynasty spokesperson said Tuesday. “That said, the health and safety of the 70 employees based in St Petersburg is paramount.”

This marks the first time that Dynasty has had to evacuate since moving to Florida although the spokesperson said “we moved to a remote environment for a time during COVID in March 2020.”

“Dynasty has been in a primarily in-office work environment since summer of 2021,” the spokesperson pointed out, adding Dynasty “works closely with our building regarding the best practices for hurricane protocol and follows all city- and statewide directives.”

The firm closed its headquarters office at 5 p.m. on Tuesday and planned to keep it closed on Wednesday and Thursday, the spokesperson added.

Ark Investment Management, another St. Petersburg-based firm, declined to comment on its plans Tuesday.

(Pictured: Raymond James’ headquarters in St. Petersburg, Florida)


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