Independent BDs

Advisor-owned financial services firm HighTower has snapped up a Credit Suisse advisor team with about $1 billion in assets under management, marking the eighth team to move to the firm this year.

More than three in four advisors expect to continue selling variable annuities and allocate 11% of their assets under management toward these products, according to Cogent Research.

A new survey of broker-dealers highlights the extent to which their firms rely on back-office technology to manage and improve advisor relationships, while at the same time revealing broad dissatisfaction with the solutions that firms have currently deployed.

Birmingham, Ala.-based advisor group Bridgeworth Financial, with nearly $1 billion in AUM, has left Lincoln Financial to join the country's largest independent B-D, LPL Financial, in a move that demonstrates the benefits of scale.

FINRA levied almost $40 million in fines in the first half of the year and will likely doll out as much or more through the end of the year.

Insights gained at humble jobs long ago have helped these planners shape their messages to clients.

LPL Financial has announced an affiliation with Advantage Financial Group that will bring client assets of about $2 billion to LPL.

There have been more advances in technology for independent advisors in the past decade than there were in the previous 30 years. And the speed of this change is accelerating even faster today, giving advisors more tools to provide even better service to an even larger group of clients.

In the ongoing consolidation of the independent B-D space, insurer AIG's acquisition of Woodbury Financial Services brings the smaller firm in from the cold where it has become increasingly challenging to survive without a larger parent company.

You can always just add an advisor to the mix, but Kristen Pruitt, vice president of business development at Investment Professionals Inc., makes sure the cultural fit is right-or else the whole thing can fail.

American International Group will acquire the independent broker-dealer from the Hartford Financial Services Group.

LPL Financial reported second quarter net income of $39.5 million, down $6 million compared to $45.5 million in the same quarter of 2011. Net revenues for the second quarter of 2012 increased 1.5% to $907 million, from $894.0 million in the prior year period.

Two financial advisors, Matt Browning and Monica Bacon-Proctor, have been added to independent broker-dealer Securities America’s base of registered representatives.

As part of the service, SumRidge will offer RIAs and broker-dealers daily, weekly and monthly trading desk commentary in the fixed-income markets.

Sallie Larsen will ensure that LPL remains an engaging workplace for its staff and professionals, including those who recruit advisors to the independent broker-dealer.

The nation’s largest independent broker-dealer was honored for proving outstanding support to its financial advisors.

Jeffrey Patterson and Rick Pucci have become registered representatives with the La Vista, Neb., based independent broker-dealer.

Profitability has become a serious challenge for independent broker-dealer firms, according to a survey by Cerulli.

The Financial Services Institute has expanded its agenda to include retirement and tax issues. As part of the expansion, the independent broker-dealer advocacy group has hired Robert Lewis as government affairs counsel for tax and retirement.

The independent broker-dealer is betting that grouping women by life events, not their ages, is the better way to reach them.