Bank of America's Merrill Lynch reports a 1% increase in number of financial advisers

Merrill Lynch reported a 1% net increase in the number of financial advisers at the firm at the end of 2016, according to this morning's fourth-quarter earnings announcement from Merrill's parent, Bank of America Corp. With the additional 129 advisers, the wirehouse now has a total of 14,629 advisers under the Merrill Lynch brand. Net income at the Global Wealth and Investment Management unit, which includes Merrill Lynch, was $634 million in the fourth quarter, an increase of 1.8% compared with the same quarter a year earlier. Revenue in the unit was $4.4 billion for the quarter, down 2.3% compared with the final quarter of 2015. Bank of America is expecting a boost in income this year from rising interest rates. "While the recent rise in interest rates came too late to impact fourth-quarter results, we expect to see a significant increase in net interest income in the first quarter of 2017," chief financial officer Paul M. Donofrio said in a release. It was the 12th consecutive quarter of experienced adviser growth as a result of successful graduates from the firm's training program, competitive recruiting and historically low competitive adviser attrition levels, the company said in a statement. Productivity reached $1.25 million per experienced adviser, while total adviser productivity was $960,000, according to the firm. (More: Morgan Stanley teams up with data-aggregation company Addepar to get insight into clients' holdings)