Wells surpasses BofA/Merrill’s brokerage force — for now

Make way for the “Thundering Herd.”

Make way for the “Thundering Third.”
As the head count at the combined Bank of America Corp. and Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc. brokerage business declined by roughly 2,000 reps during the first quarter, Wells Fargo & Co. beefed up its adviser group and now boasts a larger number of reps than BofA/Merrill.
Wells Fargo, which acquired Wachovia Corp. at the beginning of the year, has 15,879 financial advisers, according to the San Francisco-based bank’s first-quarter earnings filing.
That’s slightly more than the 15,822 advisers that BofA reported earlier in the week, when the Charlotte, N.C.-based banking company noted that its adviser head count had declined by more than 2,000, mostly trainees, during the first three months of the year.
Wells Fargo stated in its filing yesterday that its “strong recruiting” of financial advisers enabled it to add 183 reps to its head count during the first quarter.
In addition to Wells Fargo, Merrill Lynch of New York and its Thundering Herd of reps, which for years ranked as the largest brokerage force in the industry, may soon see its head count surpassed by another competitor as well, which would make it the third-largest wirehouse in the business.
Morgan Stanley is prepping to combine its brokerage operations in a joint venture with Citigroup Inc.’s Smith Barney unit later this year, a merger that’s likely to create a brokerage unit with roughly 20,000 advisers.
Morgan Stanley revealed yesterday that it had 8,148 reps at the end of the first quarter, while Citigroup of New York noted that it employed 12,659 reps, which adds up to a force of 20,807 reps.