Hybrid RIA Bolts LPL for Triad

A former LPL-affiliated RIA has shifted broker-dealers to hybrid specialist Triad Advisors.

Summit Financial, based in Westlake Village, Calif., is a primarily fee-based RIA offering clients investment management, insurance and retirement planning, says Triad, which offers advisory firms both a broker-dealer and a fee-based RIA multi-custodial platform.

Neil Elmouchi, Summit's founder and president, heads a team of four financial advisors and 10 support professionals, according to a Triad announcement of the deal. Up to a quarter of Summit's clients are high-net-worth individuals, according to the firm's most recent ADV.

Summit manages roughly $101 million in assets, according to that March 2015 ADV, although the Triad announcement put the figure higher, at roughly $225 million. The company says through a spokesman that it has an additional $110 million-plus in "both fee-based and brokerage assets held on various Triad corporate RIA and brokerage platforms."

Elmouchi launched Summit in 1985, working through a few broker-dealers before landing at LPL Financial nearly 17 years ago, according to FINRA's BrokerCheck.

Revenue at Triad is up nearly 15% in the last year to almost $177 million, according to a spokesman. In 2014, the firm neared $20 million in new recruiting revenues and signed on the Farmington, Conn.-based Wealth Management Group of North America, which had approximately $130 million in assets.

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