Wells Fargo Advisors recently snatched up the Munster Freeman Group, a private wealth team managing $3 billion in assets which was previously under Merrill Private Wealth Management.
This move comes after more than a decade with Merrill. Led by Bruce Munster, his son Samuel Munster and David Freeman, the group focuses on merger and acquisition advisory as well as personal wealth management, serving entrepreneurs, entertainers, investors and executives. Target sectors include technology, specialty finance, consumer products, business services and space.
The team is now based out of El Segundo, according to the Wells Fargo Advisors site.
Prior to joining Merrill Lynch, Bruce Munster was a managing director at Morgan Stanley, and he spent time as a private wealth adviser at UBS. Freeman has similar experience having been a financial adviser at UBS Wealth Management and part of Morgan Stanley’s Family Wealth Group in Los Angeles. Samuel Munster, who joined Merrill in 2016, said he was “excited” for the transition, in a recent LinkedIn post. “My team and I look forward to building on the firm’s strength and to continue delivering for our clients,” he wrote.
Making moves
Wells Fargo Advisors has been on the offense lately. In addition to securing the Munster Freeman Group, WFA brought in the Kang, Dime, Tran, Osborne Group to its platform – also from Merrill. The Bellevue, Washington-based private wealth group has $1 billion in assets and liabilities, Barron’s reported.
In another move, the team scooped up the Kolker Group, based in New York, from J.P. Morgan where the firm had been since 2017. This adds more than $500 million to Wells Fargo’s platform. They also lost an Illinois team – Gold Key Private Wealth – to startup &Partners, originally founded by former Wells Fargo Advisors Chief Executive David Kowach.
“With many exceptional financial advisers choosing our firm this year, it’s clear our platform and commitment to client success continue to resonate across the Los Angeles market,” Paul Vannuki, WFA’s market leader for Los Angeles, said in a statement obtained by AdvisorHub.
For the third quarter, Wells Fargo reported a total revenue of $4.2 billion for its wealth and investment management division, up 8% from the third quarter of 2024. Total assets sat at $2.5 trillion, a 7.8% increase from a year ago.
