And the "wheel" the firm refers to is the private-client advisory business. Wealth-management platform provider US Fiduciary has a new president in former Smith Barney executive Robert Drake, who will also serve as COO. The appointment caps a half-year search to replace Elliot Weissbluth, who left the Houston-based wealth-management platform provider earlier this year.

New names

"We have spent the past six months in our searches and our efforts have paid off," says US Fiduciary's founder and CEO Steven Graubart -- referring to Drake's appointment as well as those of divisional officer Jeffery Sills, Smith Barney's former head of financial-planning sales, operations v.p. Keith Roberts, ex of Stanford Financial, and advisor-services chief Michael Walton, who comes to US Fiduciary from AIM Investments, where he managed a team of fifty client service reps supporting Financial Advisors.

"We needed seasoned executives with a deep understanding [of] and experience [in] recruiting, retaining, and developing high-end financial advisors, and building and leading a management team [that is] focused on business consulting, operations, out-sourced partnerships, and business execution," says Graubart. "Bob Drake, Jeff Sills, Keith Roberts, and Michael Walton are just that leadership team to deliver into our market."

Weissbluth, US Fiduciary's CFO Cindy Burnette, sales and business-development chief James Lynch and compliance head Matthew Reynolds negotiated separations from the firm within days of each other in March 2007. They left at about the same time US Fiduciary received an infusion of venture-funding from New York-based Inter-Atlantic Group.

A la carte

Since these executives left, US Fiduciary has added two advisory teams -- based in Joliet, Ill., and Murrells Inlet, S.C. -- to its RIA, and New York-based RIA Satovsky Asset Management has signed on to its use its broker-dealer. Last month US Fiduciary advisor George Wislar left to set up his own RIA, but he plans to continue using US Fiduciary's investment platform to help fill out client portfolios.

Three-year-old US Fiduciary is out to give ex-wirehouse brokers and other "captive" advisors the freedom and flexibility to serve their clients as fiduciaries with the option of accessing support around practice management, technology, marketing and investment products. In the past at least, the firm has demonstrated robust transition-management capabilities, according to US Fiduciary advisors.

"We are not reinventing the wheel at US Fiduciary, [but] we are re-pricing and re-packaging the way high-end financial advisors work with their service providers, manage their businesses, and deliver sophistication to their clients," says Graubart. "A lot of wealth-management services are commoditized, and our pricing around those aspects reflects that," adds Graubart. "But there are other areas where we believe we add significant value, as with our [investment] research and our alternatives [platform]."

Another characteristic of US Fiduciary that Graubart mentions is its ability to support fee-based advisors who need to provide commission-based trading services to clients. "It's not a large part of what our advisors do, but it can be important," he says -- when, for example, advisors want to be helpful to the junior family members of their clients.

Intently focused

Houston-based US Fiduciary started out with two advisory offices through the pre-launch acquisitions of Houston-based Post Oak Capital Advisors and Chicago-based West Hills Asset Management. Since July 2005 it has established brokers from wirehouses, regionals, independent broker-dealers and big banks in offices in Philadelphia, Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., Traverse, Mich., Princeton, N.J., Scottsdale, Ariz. (where US Fiduciary has two affiliates), Leesburg, Va. -- plus its newer offices in Illinois and South Carolina.

In addition to providing middle-office support to Wislar's and Satovsky's advisories, US Fiduciary works with a New York-based private-client advisory run by alterative-investment specialist David Zale.

Advisors with Chicago-based New Century Bank, Palo Alto, Calif.-based Addison Avenue Financial Partners, Chicago-based brokersXpress, and Houston-based American General Securities use US Fiduciary's investment platform.

Napa, Calif.-based Essex National Securities, a brokerage-service provider to banks, just entered into a distribution arrangement with U.S. Fiduciary.

And now, says Graubart, even as US Fiduciary continues to push for new anchor affilates, especially in major U.S. markets, it is also setting its sights on recruiting productive, fee-based brokers to help build out individual franchises.

That's a task US Fiduciary's new president Drake is looking forward to. "My experience of working with team formation, and consulting with financial advisors and branch managers to grow and drive financial results has been my training ground for this opportunity," he says. "The environment today is intently focused on being an Independent Financial Advisor and not jumping from one wirehouse to another." -FWR

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