Lindsay Hans, the head of Merrill Private Wealth Management’s Northeast division, will take over leading Private Wealth Management, according to the company. Hans is succeeding Don Plaus, who announced his retirement last week after 32 years at the firm.
Plaus’ retirement and Hans’ ascension into his vacated role of head of Private Wealth Management, International and Institutional, means Keith Glenfield, the head of the firm’s Investment Solutions & Personal Retirement division, will succeed Hans as the executive for Merrill’s Northeast division. Nancy Fahmy, the head of Alternative Investments, will continue in that role while taking on Glenfield’s purview of investment solutions.
In a statement, Merrill Wealth Management President Andy Sieg said the shuffled leadership positions would help drive “responsible growth” for the company.
“We have a deep bench of industry-leading talent with diverse perspectives,” Sieg said. “Lindsay, Keith and Nancy are top-performing leaders who will continue to advance our modern Merrill strategy in these expanded roles.”
Hans took over at the Northeast division, one of the firm’s largest, in late 2021 after previous head Bill Lorenz retired. Prior to that, Hans ran the firm’s Mid-Atlantic division.
Hans will continue to act as a member of the Bank of America Global Diversity and Inclusion Council and as a National Executive Sponsor on the Merrill Women’s Exchange. She was first registered with UBS in 2001 before moving to Merrill in 2014, according to her BrokerCheck profile.
Nancy Fahmy (left) and Keith Glenfield
Glenfield, who will succeed Hans in the Northeast division, joined Merrill 27 years ago and will continue to work on business integration across the firm. Currently, Glenfield also serves as chair of the Money Management Institute’s Board of Directors.
Fahmy is on the board of the Institute for Portfolio Alternatives, and also works as a part of the Limited Partner Advisory Council for Sponsors for Educational Opportunity and is a member of the Women's Leadership Council.
The personnel shifts come after Merrill Wealth reported that it had boosted its advisor head count year over year among “all wealth management businesses,” according to its Q4 2022 earnings report. During the earnings call in January, Sieg predicted the firm would continue to see 3% to 4% average advisor growth per year in the next decade.
“The growth I’m talking about, the 3% to 4% growth in advisors, a good deal of that will take place in the Merrill business, given the scale of the Merrill business and the central role that advisors play in serving high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth clients, in particular,” he said during the call. “You just can’t overstate the role an advisor plays."
