Merrill Lynch Speeds Up Team Placement for Trainees
Bank of America Merrill Lynch will allow advisor trainees in the firm’s development program to join existing advisor teams sooner, one of a series of enhancements Merrill is making to its trainee program.
According to Head of Client Service John Towey (who heads the trainee program), the four adjustments were based on feedback from trainees, advisors and market leadership, and were “building on what already works.”
“Team-based practices are increasingly how advisors serve clients and build enduring businesses,” Towey said during the firm’s wealth-focused earnings call Tuesday. “And by allowing trainees to join them earlier, we’ll help them contribute more quickly while supporting succession planning for established teams.”
According to Towey, the trainee program currently enrolls about 2,400 workers, with about three-quarters on track for completion (exceeding the industry’s historical success rate of about 30%).
Merrill reworked aspects of the program in 2021 (including a ban on cold-calling, broadened to encompass all of Merrill’s business, and a reduction in the program’s length to 18 months). Towey said the trainees will manage an average of $64 million in client assets by graduation.
In addition to allowing trainees to join advisor teams sooner, Merrill will provide earlier access to its full suite of products, accompanied by training on how to get the most out of the firm’s platform. The wirehouse will also provide additional business development support to trainees, with Towey arguing that trainees are well-positioned to help more clients.
Finally, the firm is creating a new “advisor development program client associate role,” providing an additional entry point that would allow trainees to begin their careers supporting a Merrill office and its advisors, which Towey said would provide “earlier exposure to client service, practice management and the day-to-day operations of an advisory business.”
The firm’s wealth division reported about 5,400 net new relationships with clients with assets of over $500,000 each in the second quarter (a year-over-year increase of approximately 11%). While the firm doesn’t break down where those households come from (whether recruited advisors, trainees or existing advisors), Merrill Wealth Co-Head Lindsay Hans said that “all of those things contribute.”
“When you look at our build and recruiting, and especially as you see over the last couple of years, and the hires that we’ve had in the last quarter, our pipeline is the strongest that we’ve seen it here, coming up in the next three months,” she said.
According to Hans and Merrill Wealth Co-Head Eric Schimpf, Merrill Wealth’s second-quarter revenue reached a record $5.7 billion, a 16% year-over-year jump, driven by higher asset management fees, loan and net interest income.
The firm hit $4.1 trillion in client balances (a 12% year-over-year increase), while assets under management reached a record high of $1.8 trillion in the second quarter, up 18% year-over-year. In 2026, the firm said it’d seen about $20 billion in brokerage assets shift into Merrill’s investment advisory program.
