Baird has opened a second office in Houston with the addition of a branch manager from UBS and seven advisors with over $770 million in assets from Wells Fargo.
The Milwaukee-based firm has tapped former UBS complex manager John Hantak to oversee both Houston offices as it looks to take advantage of client and recruiting opportunities in Texas, according to the managing director of the Private Wealth Management Group at Baird, John Mabee. The firm currently has around 700 advisors, 37 of whom are in Dallas, Fort Worth and Houston.
“Texas has been an excellent market particularly over the last three or four years,” Mabee said. “We have a pretty good presence in Dallas and pretty good presence in Fort Worth, and then this opportunity presented itself in Houston, so we are very excited to get people of this caliber on board.”
Hantak is joined by a group of seven from Wells Fargo including: J. Gillette Burns, director; Orlando C. Montesino, senior vice president; Andrew A. Atkinson; Richard G. Pfeil, vice president; Matthew Leatherwood; Thomas S. Davis, vice president; C. Nelson Shields, Jr., vice president. All are former legacy A.G. Edwards advisors who moved to Wells Fargo through a series of mergers with Wachovia and Wells Fargo in 2007 and 2008, respectively. Their business model focuses on retirement planning needs of professionals in the oil and gas industry.
“We look really hard for good people,” Mabee said. “There are just so many good adult [financial advisors] that have been displaced and are now working for firms that they didn’t sign up for.”
Hantak began his career in 2004, according to registration records with the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority. He also served at Citi Smith Barney and had been at UBS since 2009.
Burns, Montesino and Atkinson have worked together as the Burns Financial Group for eight years. Burns began at A.G. Edwards in 2000, Montesino began in 1999, and Atkinson started at A.G. Edwards in 2003.
Industry veteran Richard Pfeil also began at A.G. Edwards in 2003, and Leatherwood joined A.G. Edwards in 2007.
With over three decades of experience, David began his career in 1981 at Rotan Mosle and joined A.G. Edwards in 1990.
Shields started with American Express Financial Advisors in 1994 and moved to A.G. Edwards that same year.
