July 29, 2022
Louis Diamond Quoted
by Miriam Rozen and Mason Braswell
With UBS Wealth Management USA’s reporting this week of an unusual net outflow of advisory assets in the second quarter, executives may be feeling some nostalgia for a longstanding award that was excised from broker compensation plans this year.
UBS in January did away with a so-called strategic objective award that had been part of its comp plan for more than five years and paid brokers a bonus of up to six percentage points of trailing-12 revenue for net new asset growth. The award was similar to programs at UBS’s wirehouse competitors who have their own systems of sticks and carrots to incentivize brokers to gin up asset growth.
There were some large defections during the quarter, including two groups with a combined $4.6 billion in assets who moved in New York City and a $1.4 billion-AUM Denver broker who left to open his own registered investment advisory firm.
“We have absolutely seen advisor defections linked to the 2022 compensation plan changes,” said Louis Diamond, an industry recruiter with Diamond Consultants, who recruits for rival firms.
UBS’s Americas wealth headcount was down 2% year-over-year to 6,139 brokers at the end of June from 6,274 a year ago, according to its earnings report this week.
A UBS spokesperson declined to comment for this story.
