2010 Predictions

I wish everyone a happy, healthy, and prosperous new year. With social niceties out of the way, here then is my obligatory column making my recruiting predictions for 2010: The Big 4 Wirehouses will continue to raid each other with super-sized checks. They will also go great lengths to differentiate themselves from each other. Watch for special considerations to be made to big producers who are suspected to be leaving. For example, there are still some ex-Prudential Securities Advisors, now with Wells Fargo, who are still on special payouts or with support levels locked in with a contract. These deals were given when Pru was going through its death throes prior to being bought by Wachovia. Similarly, because bigness at its worst makes firms’ policies inflexible, these same big firms will default to special circumstance concessions in order to keep big producer butts in their seats. The Regional Firms will have a tough time duplicating their extraordinary recruiting results from 2009. The tsunami that created universal misery in the retail brokerage industry was a once in a lifetime event (we hope!) which also created a once in a lifetime recruiting environment for smaller firms. The ones that will continue to excel are the select, elite smaller firms who can prove to the substantive Wirehouse Advisor that their platform is as good, if not better, than what that Advisor is leaving behind. In a presumably normalized 2010 environment, they must learn to sell something other than “we have a nice culture and our name hasn’t been in the press.” The Boutique firms attached to an investment bank will look more attractive as underwriting activity improves during 2010. They remain attractive to the Advisor who can take advantage of special product offerings and also leverage synergistic relationships with Bankers. Independent firms and pseudo-independent firms will continue to thrive and attract the Advisors who can not only run their own practice, but also those who can run their own business. For the Independent minded who does is not willing to run the entire show, there are solutions which will take significant portions of the administrative headaches off the shoulders of the Advisor and his or her team, enabling the practitioner to actually spend more time with prospects and clients. Of course, I may have gotten it all wrong. Time will tell.