HighTower grabs Merrill Lynch adviser managing $320M

HighTower Advisors is speeding up recruitment as the year draws to a close with the addition of an elite New York-based Merrill Lynch broker to its partnership, the firm said on Monday. Laurie C. Kamhi is breaking away from Merrill Lynch Wealth Management's Private Banking and Investment Group, where she managed $320 million for well-heeled clients and institutions. Also moving with Kamhi is her all-woman team, which also includes a financial analyst and an associate, known as LCK Wealth Management. The announcement marks the third team that HighTower has brought on board within the past three weeks. The teams managed $1.23 billion for clients at wirehouse outposts in the Northeast. Ms. Kamhi worked in institutional stock and option trading as well as institutional sales at the now-defunct firms Dean Witter and Kidder Peabody. She started at Merrill in 1993, according to a Merrill biography that previously appeared on the firm's website. Ana Sollitto, a spokeswoman for Merrill parent Bank of America Corp., declined to comment. The team is the 41st to join HighTower since the firm was founded in 2008. But the recent pace of recruiting for the firm has slowed considerably from the past three years, according to data in the InvestmentNews Advisers on the Move database.