August 26, 2021
Father-son duo, John (far left) and Ryan Birkhauser (far proper) flank their teammates, Cassandra Spindler (second from left) and Tabitha Kenney (second from proper), who made the transfer with them from Merrill Lynch to RBC.
RBC Wealth Administration on Thursday nabbed a Chicago-area Merrill Lynch Wealth Administration father-son group that managed greater than $500 million in shopper property, in response to an RBC spokesperson.
John Birkhauser, the daddy, has labored greater than 42 years within the trade, and his son Ryan has logged 9 years within the enterprise, all at Merrill, in response to BrokerCheck information. They moved together with advisor Tabitha Kenney, a 14-year trade veteran, and shopper affiliate Cassandra Spindler.
They’re the second group to hitch a Lake Forest department that opened in April with a $2 billion-asset group from Merrill. Each report back to Justin Ferdula, a Chicago complicated director who joined from Morgan Stanley in 2017. Ferdula didn’t return a name for remark.
“We had been searching for a agency with a smaller really feel and robust tradition, that additionally shares our deal with the client-advisor relationship, and we discovered that in RBC Wealth Administration,” Ryan Birkhauser stated in an announcement.
The duo, whose transfer was not but mirrored on BrokerCheck, didn’t return a phone name on their transfer, and the RBC spokeswoman declined to supply their manufacturing.
Spokespeople for Merrill didn’t return a request for touch upon the transfer or the brokers’ assertion.
The Birkhausers’ departure got here coincidentally on the day after Merrill Lynch President Andy Sieg unveiled a two-month-long marketing campaign referred to as “Mission Thunder” to deal with frequent issues among the many Merrill drive that was learn by brokers and former managers as an effort to spice up retention amid a rising variety of departures.
Like a number of current exits, Ryan Birkhauser, who graduated in 2007 from Northwestern College, was a top-ranked ‘Subsequent-Era’ dealer, in response to Forbes, which listed him as #109 final yr. He was additionally a “Finest in State” dealer for the final three years. He has no disclosures on his BrokerCheck file.
His father opened Merrill’s Lake Forest workplace in 2000, and the department has grown to handle over $1.5 billion in property, in response to their Merrill biography.
The elder Birkhauser has two disclosures on his a lot lengthier BrokerCheck file, the newest in 2018, when the agency settled for $10,000 a shopper’s $65,000 declare primarily based on allegations about unsuitable funding suggestions and misrepresentation. In his touch upon the file, Birkhauser denied the allegations and wrongdoing and stated he didn’t contribute to the settlement.
His file additionally displays a 2002 shopper declare for nearly $2.7 million, which was settled for $666,666, and was primarily based on allegations of “unauthorized buying and selling, unsuitable investments and misrepresentations with respect to analysis suggestions.”
The third advisor on the group, Kenney, began within the trade in 2006 at Morgan Stanley and moved to Merrill in 2008, in response to her BrokerCheck file, which has no disclosures.