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Merrill Lynch Wealth Management is overhauling its storied financial-advisor training program.
The firm said it would ban cold calling, shorten the program, and aim for high graduation rates.
Merrill paused trainees cold calls last year after a spate of outreach-related violations.
Bank of America s wealth-management business is overhauling its sprawling training program for financial advisors, including instating a cold-calling ban. This ends nearly a year of uncertainty for about 3,000 trainees who were told last summer that a pause on cold-contacting prospective clients would be temporary.
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Issues in Merrill Lynch s massive pipeline for financial advisors are weighing on trainees morale.
Advisors in training have faced months of mixed messaging about prospecting, people say.
Bank of America s wealth management unit is among the largest in the US, overseeing trillions.
Restrictions on Merrill Lynch Wealth Management financial advisors in training are stretching into a ninth month and have shown no signs of lifting.
An unprecedented pause on reaching out to prospective clients has hurt trainee morale and added frustrations in a program where building a book of business is critical to success. The firm has fired a handful of trainees for violating the terms of the pause since it went into effect last July.
The hold in trainees client prospecting activity can have a meaningful impact on trainees morale. If advisors-in-training are not able to build their networks and books of business, their progress can be stunted.
The person familiar with the matter, who requested anonymity to speak freely, said some trainees are frustrated and in limbo. The program trains some 3,000 to 3,500 at any one time.
The Financial Advisor Development Program (FADP) and ones like it across Wall Street generally have low graduation rates, as many drop out of the intensive, multi-year program or shift to other areas of the bank. We announced in October a new Advisory division within Merrill, now responsible for advisor training and development. Our prospecting pause remains in place while the leadership of this new division refines our strategy and approach to improving the early and long-term success of our advisors, a Merrill spokesperson said.