NewEdge nabs $6B team, Janney pulls from UBS: Advisor Moves

November 20, 2025 1:49 PM

GFR & Associates is joining Janney Montgomery Scott in Hudson, Ohio.

If wealth management slows down around the holidays, there was little evidence in industry recruiting and M&A announcements this week.

The large RIA NewEdge Wealth picked up a $6 billion team from an industry rival while Janney Montgomery Scott, Wells Fargo and Raymond James all pulled big teams from rivals. And Carson Group, Farther, Beacon Pointe and MAI Capital Management were back out on the M&A trail. Read about it below.

NewEdge Wealth picks up $6B AUM team from Summit Trail Advisors

A trio of advisors formerly with the large New York-based RIA Summit Trail Advisors has left to join its industry rival NewEdge Wealth.

Justin C. Waterman, Sarah N. Silverio and Alexander Shapses had been managing roughly $6 billion at Summit Trail and joined NewEdge on Friday. Summit Trail was founded in 2015 by Jack Petersen, formerly an executive at Barclays. Waterman also has ties to Barclays. He moved to Barclays after it bought his former firm, Lehman Brothers, in 2008 during the financial crash. He went to Citi Private Bank in 2010 and then moved to Summit Trail in 2017 after several years at the RIA Fischer & Company.

Silverio joined Summit Trail in 2022, and Alexander Shapses joined in 2021 after starting his career in 2002 at Walnut Street Securities and having stints at various firms. New Orleans-based NewEdge Advisors is the independent contractor division of NewEdge Capital Group, which also includes the separate RIA NewEdge Wealth and the broker-dealer NewEdge Securities. NewEdge Capital Group is, in turn, owned by EdgeCo Holdings, which receives backing from the private equity firm Parthenon Capital and Waterfall Asset Management.

NewEdge Capital manages about $64 billion in client assets through its three subsidiaries and has more than 450 advisors and registered representatives, according to its website.

Janney pulls teams with $800M in total from UBS, David Lerner

Janney Montgomery Scott has turned to UBS and the broker-dealer David Lerner Associates to pull teams in Ohio, New York and Texas.

GFR & Associates is joining Janney in Hudson, Ohio. The team had formerly managed $600 million at UBS.

GFR is led by the husband-and-wife team of Garret Ferrara and Michele Ferrara. Also part of the team is the financial advisor Michael Burrows and senior registered private client associates Candace Kyer and Mei Chen Goodson. Garrett Ferrara started his career at Merrill in 1994 and moved to UBS in 2009, and Michelle Ferrara followed essentially the same path.

Separately, Jembelis Kinkel Financial Partners is joining Janney in Purchase, New York. The team formerly managed $200 million at the broker-dealer David Lerner Associates.

The group consists of the financial advisors Nick Jembelis and Michael Kinkel, and the senior registered private client associate Raymond Karst. Jembelis started at David Lerner in 1999, and Kinkel started there in 2011.

Wells Fargo recruits $543M team from JPMorgan

Wells Fargo is adding to its presence in New York with a team pulled from JPMorgan.

Kolker Group, composed of the advisors Jack Kolker and James Cordon, are joining Wells Fargo in New York City. They had formerly managed $543 million in client assets at JPMorgan.

Kolker started his career in 1983 at Halpert, Oberst and Co. and moved to Bear Stearns in 1987, UBS in 2001, Morgan Stanley in 2009 and JPMorgan in 2017. Cordon started at UBS in 2001 and also moved to Morgan Stanley in 2009 and JPMorgan in 2017,

The team also has a four-person support staff, including a financial consultant, an associate private client advisor, a senior registered client associate and a client performance analyst.

Raymond James pulls father-and-sons team from Morgan Stanley

Raymond James is adding to its channel for employee advisors with a family-run practice pulled from Morgan Stanley.

John Fisher and his two sons, John Curtis "JC" Fisher and Harrison Fisher, have joined Raymond James & Associates in Atlanta as Fisher Wealth Partners of Raymond James. They had previously managed $360 million at Morgan Stanley.

John Fisher started his career at Merrill in 1984, moved to UBS in 1988 and then Morgan Stanley in 2017. JC Fisher started at UBS in 2011 and also joined Morgan Stanley in 2017. Harrison Fisher started at Lord Abbett & Co. in 2014 and moved to Morgan Stanley in 2020 following a short stint at Deutsche Bank.

Joining them at Raymond James are registered client service associate Lesley Laws and portfolio associate Sebastian Russell.

Carson Group acquires $1.45B Total Wealth Planning

The serial RIA-acquirer Carson Group is extending its presence in Ohio with the purchase of a firm with roughly $1.45 billion in client assets.

Total Wealth Planning, a 19-person wealth planning firm out of Cincinnati, has joined Carson Group, becoming the firm's 34th wholly owned office and the latest to take on the Carson Wealth brand. Its addition pushes Carson Group to over $50 billion in assets under management.

Total Wealth Planning is known for serving clients described as "quiet millionaires" in the Midwest. The team is led by the managing partners and wealth advisors Robert Lemmons, Robert Siegmann and David Wilder.

Carson Group CEO Burt White said the deal "caps a record-breaking year for Carson and reflects the momentum we're seeing across the marketplace." Carson Group has completed 22 acquisitions in 2025.

Besides its wholly owned offices, Carson has more than 160 RIAs in its network division operating as independent contractors. Carson Group is one of many firms in the wealth management industry that's tapping private equity capital to buy RIAs. It sold a minority stake in itself in 2021 to the private equity powerhouse Bain Capital in a deal giving it an implied value of $1 billion.

Beacon Pointe acquires $1.2B women-led RIA

The RIA acquirer Beacon Pointe Advisors has acquired Hemington Wealth Management, a registered investment advisory with $1.2 billion in client assets and offices in Falls Church, Virginia, and Chicago.

The deal marks Beacon Pointe's fifth acquisition of a female-led team this year and 12th transaction, all told. It increases Beacon Pointe's total assets under advisement to roughly $55 billion.

Hemington Wealth Management, a women-led RIA with $1.2 billion in client assets, has joined Beacon Pointe Advisors.

The 16-person Hemington team is led by Eileen O'Connor and Jen Dawson, and specializes in serving high net worth clients and families. The firm is known for its Women of Wealth studies, a program designed to provide insights into women's financial priorities.

Beacon Pointe President Matt Cooper said in a statement that, "Our collaboration with Hemington celebrates the continued rise of women shaping the future of wealth management."

Beacon Pointe Advisors, which has its headquarters in Newport Beach, California, now has more than 650 team members in 80 offices in the U.S. The firm receives financial backing from the private equity giant KKR.

Physician-specialist advisory team with $520M in assets joins Farther

The technology-heavy RIA Farther has acquired a four-person advisory team that specializes in working with doctors.

Masso Torrence Wealth Management is joining New York-based Farther in Marlton, New Jersey. The team manages $400 million in client assets and $120 million held in retirement plans and specializes in providing advice to physicians.

The Masso Torrence team consists of Christopher Masso, John Torrence, Nicholas Pantle and Samantha Grisham. Managing partners Masso and Torrence were both formerly at Commonwealth Financial Network, which was acquired by LPL Financial in August.

Joining Farther will allow Masso Torrence to bring all of its clients' financial data into one central system, the two said in a joint statement.

"That not only streamlines our operations, but frees our team to spend more one-on-one time with the clients we serve, helping them plan for the future of businesses through succession planning and business exits," they said.

Farther, which was founded in 2019 by a former Goldman Sachs employee and former investment banker and management consultant, announced in August that its client asset tally was on pace to reach $13 billion in the first half of the year. That's around three times what it was at the start of the year.

MAI Capital buys $366M RIA Court Place Advisors

The RIA consolidator MAI Capital Management is adding to its presence in the Mid-Atlantic with the purchase of an RIA in Maryland.

Court Place Advisors, out of Ellicott City, Maryland, brings $366 million to Cleveland-based MAI Capital. The terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Rick Buoncore is CEO of MAI Capital Management.

MAI Capital Management

Court Place was co-founded in 1998 by Jack Santry, now a senior wealth advisor and managing director. Court Place's specialities include asset management and tax and estate planning.

The deal will enable Court Place to make use of the MAI brand and draw on its expertise in human resources, operations and marketing. The team will also gain access to MAI's 150 specialists in investment, planning and taxes. All current Court Place employees are joining MAI.

This move comes on the heels of MAI's landmark acquisition of Evoke Advisors, a firm with $27 billion in client assets, and marks the 18th firm to join MAI since January 2024. MAI Capital Management, founded in 1973, now has more than $65 billion in client assets and 650 employees in 35 offices in the U.S.

Prudential Advisors boosts headcount 9% through October

Prudential Advisors, the wealth management arm of Prudential Financial, brought in roughly $3 billion in new client assets in the first 10 months of the year.

Prudential said this week that itsAUM boost largely came from the recruitment of experienced advisors. The firm said its advisor headcount had risen by 9% through the end of October to more than 3,000.

Since 2024, Prudential has been using LPL Financial as its custodian, brokerage and RIA services. When that deal was announced, Prudential had more than 2,600 advisors and $50 billion in client assets.

Prudential said the newly recruited advisors have 25 years of industry experience on average.

"By leveraging our global brand, deep planning expertise, and the capabilities of our partnership with LPL Financial, we're well positioned to help more people achieve financial security and protect their life's work," Caroline Feeney, global head of Prudential's Retirement and Insurance businesses, said in a statement.

Wells Fargo names new head of investment products

Wells Fargo will have a new head of investment products within its wealth and investment management business at the start of the year.

Tim Froehlich, now head of insurance and annuities at Wells Fargo Advisors, will step into his new position on Jan. 1. He'll be taking the place of Patty Loepker, who plans to retire in March after more than 40 years at the firm.

Tim Froehlich has been named the new head of investment products within Wells Fargo's wealth and investment management business.

Froehlich's new role will have him overseeing investment offerings like structured notes, retirement services, alternative investments, insurance and annuities. He will report to Darrell Cronk, chief investment officer for the wealth and investment management business.

"As we grow the investment products business, Tim's vision and expertise will strengthen our ability to deliver innovative solutions for advisors and clients," Cronk said in a statement. "His focus on client-centricity, leadership in product origination and portfolio improvement, and more than 20 years in alternative investments make him an ideal choice to sustain WIM's leadership in this space."