LPL to lose mega hybrid RIA

$9.5-billion Independent Financial Partners to jump ship, create its own broker-dealer.

Independent Financial Partners, a hybrid RIA with roughly $9.5 billion in assets under management and more than 500 advisers, plans to leave LPL Financial as its broker-dealer, according to two people with knowledge of the decision.

One of those individuals, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said IFP intends to create its own broker-dealer. IFP’s time frame for executing these maneuvers wasn’t immediately clear.

Spokespeople for both IFP and LPL didn’t return repeated requests for comment by press time.

Independent Financial Partners, based in Tampa, Fla., serves as an office of supervisory jurisdiction for LPL.

The group has 568 individuals serving in an investment advisory role, 490 of which a registered representatives of a broker-dealer, according to its most recent Form ADV filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

IFP has $9.49 billion in discretionary AUM, and $27.4 million in non-discretionary managed assets, according to the ADV. About 70% of those assets are from individual wealth management and the bulk of the remainder from retirement plans, according to the filing.

The firm’s overall assets under advisement total $40.5 billion, the filing says.

LPL, the largest independent broker-dealer in the country, has gone through a series of business transformations recently. Dan Arnold took over as chief executive of LPL in January 2017, replacing Mark Casady. Shortly thereafter, in August 2017, LPL announced it was buying National Planning Holdings Inc., an independent broker-dealer network with 3,200 advisers.

The firm has also instituted new policies that haven’t been well received by some advisers. Two weeks after announcing the NPH acquisition, LPL said that it would begin requiring advisers who want to have an RIA outside of LPL to put at least $50 million of advisory assets under custody with LPL first.