Raymond James scores $568M ‘true aggregator’

As Raymond James racks up record numbers for adviser headcount, the firm added WealthSource Partners to its roster— including former 49ers wide receiver Jon Dubravac. The firm will find a home in Raymond James’ Investment Advisor Division.

The RIA, which had $568 million in client assets as of June 30^th, according to Raymond James, is the product of a January merger between adviser-aggregators Avant-Garde Advisors and Vellum Financial.

Garrett Hacking

WealthSource is based in San Luis Obispo, Calif. and led by CEO and Vellum founder Bryan Sullivan. The firm has advisers in California, Colorado, and Florida. Other executives include COO and Avant-Garde co-founder Eric Patton and his co-founding partner, Jon Dubravac, now chief development officer at WealthSource.

The firm will be transferring approximately $300 million in client assets from Fidelity to Raymond James, along with assets custodied elsewhere.

Dubravac, who calls WealthSource “a true aggregator,” views the switch to Raymond James as the next step in an evolution that’s been taking place since he co-founded Avant-Garde in 2009. “Having more arrows in our quiver is a benefit,” he says. “We’ve been making that push with aggregation now for seven years.”

So far they’ve had success by focusing on smaller advisers, but he says the merger provided scale that makes the firm more attractive to advisers interested in leaving wirehouses or those nearing retirement — the types of candidates they’re highly interested in recruiting. “We plan on hopefully being a multibillion-dollar firm in the near future,” he says.

WealthSource’s affiliation with Raymond James is added incentive for advisers interested in leaving their current employers and joining the RIA, says Sullivan. “Each of the firm’s divisions is recruiting advisers from the wirehouses, so they know those advisers’ expectations [and] they understand the mindset,” he says of Raymond James. Sullivan has his own background at the wirehouses, working at Merrill Lynch from 1999 until 2006, when he joined UBS. He founded Vellum in 2009.

Although research from On Wall Street shows the number of high-revenue advisers moving between firms is down in 2016, Dubravac says the timing of the merger and the switch to Raymond James “couldn’t be better.” He says they’re currently in “deep conversation” with “a couple” advisers and that they’re looking forward to picking up more advisers with the expiration of wirehouse lock-up periods.