Merrill lands four advisor teams as May recruiting data shows firm's two-way churn

Merrill's recruiting engine kept turning through late spring, with the wirehouse announcing four new advisor additions this week even as fresh industry data shows the firm shedding almost as many advisors as it brings aboard.

The headline hire is Todd Hatfield, a 25-year Morgan Stanley and legacy Smith Barney veteran who joins Merrill's Boulder, Colorado office with roughly $1.5 billion in client assets and about $4.3 million in trailing production. Hatfield, who along with his team has garnered top rankings on Forbes top advisor and team lists, brings three wealth management client associates with him – Jennifer Feeney, Susan Mohacey and Melissa Hatfield. The group joins the Mountain Plains Market under market executive Ivette Plaza.

Merrill also picked up James Bee, a more than 30-year industry veteran who's moved from Morgan Stanley to the firm's Manchester, New Hampshire office with $131 million in assets and roughly $1 million in production. He joins the Northern New England Market led by Gina Hall.

Rounding out the week, David Parrish arrives in Southlake, Texas from Wells Fargo with $125 million in client assets and about $800,000 in production, joining the Fort Worth & Associates Market under Scott McConaghy. Merrill also added next-gen advisor Anthony McMasters, who moves from Edward Jones to Shreveport, Louisiana with roughly $100 million in assets and $700,000 in production, as part of the Dallas & Associates Market.

Late last month, Merrill welcomed Peter Choy, a nearly two-decade UBS veteran managing $460 million in assets, to its Nashville, Tennessee office. Choy – a West Point graduate and recurring Forbes honoree – brought roughly $4.3 million in annual production and joined alongside three support staff in the firm's Volunteer State Market.

This week's hiring flurry sits against a broader industry backdrop of accelerating movement. Data compiled by AdvizorPro show more than 2,100 advisor transitions took place across the industry in May alone. Within that snapshot, Merrill posted 54 inflows – the third-biggest haul by count among all firms tracked, behind only LPL Financial and J.P. Morgan Securities – but also recorded 85 outflows, resulting in a net loss of 31 advisors for the month despite the strong gross recruiting figure.

That two-way churn is not unique to Merrill. J.P. Morgan Securities and Morgan Stanley likewise appeared near the top of both the inflow and outflow rankings in May, a pattern that may point to internal reorganization or team-level dissatisfaction running alongside active recruiting efforts.

Industry-wide, 2025 proved to be a record year for advisor movement, with more than 11,000 experienced advisors changing firms, according to a report from recruiting and consulting firm Diamond Consultants.

Wirehouses as a group lost a net 302 advisors last year, but Merrill's headcount trends were largely a repeat of 2024, even as recruiting deal structures across the industry – including Merrill's – have grown more aggressive in response to competitive pressure from independent platforms and rival wirehouses.

Merrill's record for 2025 may have been tainted in no small part by the historic OpenArc breakaway to the Dynasty Financial Network, which immediately triggered a legal tussle that's persisted until this year. Still, the Diamond Consultants report stressed that the headline numbers undersell positive momentum in Merrill's retention efforts.

"First, sentiment among Merrill advisors is far stronger than it was two or three years ago. Second, firm leadership touted that attrition hit its lowest level in years in Q4 2025, a promising sign for the year ahead," the report said, offering an outlook for 2026. "Merrill, like Wells, offers a top deal for inbound competitive recruits – and they are recommitted to the effort."