Merrill Lynch

The legal tussle represents the latest effort by a brokerage firm to enforce non-solicitation agreements against advisors.

The team’s client base primarily consists of business owners, corporate retirement plans, families and individuals and retirees.

Documents shed light on how two brokers overseeing trainees allegedly called hundreds of phone numbers on Merrill’s Do Not Call list.

The new hires include industry veterans and they join a growing branch in Dallas.

The margin requirements apply to Merrill Lynch wealth management clients and individual traders using the Merrill Edge platform.

Collectively, the brokers generated $167 million in annual production and oversaw $37 billion in combined client assets.

These elite producers in some cases operate far from Wall Street, even as they work for well-known wealth managers such as UBS, Merrill Lynch and Ameriprise.

Client acquisition was down compared to 2019, but still higher than in years past.

The group leader, advisor Lars Olson, had been with the wirehouse since 1994.

The Buffalo, New York location is the independent firm’s 12th nationwide.