Two large East Coast registered investment advisors that serve high-net-worth and ultrahigh-net-worth clients are joining forces. Boston-based Congress Wealth Management has completed its purchase of MainLine Private Wealth, an RIA based in the Philadelphia suburb of Wynnewood, Pa. The addition of MainLine, which oversees $1.1 billion in assets,... Free Registration Welcome to Barron’s Advisor! Our content is free but available only to wealth management professionals. To read this article,...

Goldman Sachs has agreed to pay $6 million to settle charges that it submitted thousands of incomplete or inaccurate batches of trade data to the Securities and Exchange Commission over a roughly 10-year period ending in October 2022. The SEC credited Goldman (ticker: GS) for undertaking remediation efforts to improve its processes for submitting trading data through so-called electronic blue sheets, or EBS. Goldman acknowledged the compliance failures the SEC outlined in its settlement...

After more than five years trading on the public market, Focus Financial Partners, a pioneering aggregator of registered investment advisors, has completed its sale to a private-equity firm, with trading in the stock ending this week. Focus says the all-cash sale to Clayton, Dubilier & Rice values it at more than $7 billion, more than double the company’s market capitalization at the close of trading. Stone Point Capital, an earlier investor in Focus, says it will retain a portion of its...

UBS is suing a high-producing advisor team in Atlanta that left the wirehouse earlier this year to join RBC Wealth Management, claiming it began contacting former clients in violation of nonsolicitation agreements. The team, known as the ESOP Group, is led by Leslie Lauer, who is ranked on Barron’s Top 1,200 Financial Advisors, Rebecca Glasgow, and Curt Rubinas. Each advisor is named as a defendant in UBS’ lawsuit. The... Free Registration Welcome to Barron’s Advisor! Our content is free but...

Wells Fargo reported a dramatic annual decline in profit in its wealth management unit on Friday, part of an overall earnings report that came in ahead of expectations. For the second quarter, Wells Fargo reported $487 million in net income, up $30 million, or nearly 7%, from the first quarter. But compared with the second quarter in 2022, when Wells Fargo reported wealth management profit of $603 million, the most recent period represents an annual decline of $115 million, or...