Smithy to oversee an un-named U.S. Atlantic-region market for Zurich bank. UBS has hired Brad Smithy, formerly a market manager for Merrill Lynch 's retail brokerage business, to oversee the Swiss bank's wealth-management activities in a so-far unspecified U.S. market.

"We recently hired Brad Smithy as an executive director," UBS spokesman Kris Kagel told Dow Jones. "He starts the second week of January."

Pre-merger

Smithy will be based in Weehawken, N.J., and report to John Matthews, manager of UBS Wealth Management's U.S. Atlantic region.

In a tenure with Merrill going back almost twenty years, Smithy has been a market director in Red Bank, N.J., and in Palm Beach, Fla.

Merrill is about to become part of Bank of America.

UBS Wealth Management has about $633 billion in assets under management, about 8,000 advisors and about 480 branches in the U.S. -FWR

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