Super-regional continues to expand market-specific legal-specialty teams. Wachovia's Wealth Management division has added four senior executives to its Atlanta-based legal-specialty group, which provides banking, lending, investment-management and brokerage services in addition to financial, estate and tax planning and various kinds of insurance to law firms and individual attorneys.

Teri Diekroeger and Dirk Ledford have joined Wachovia's Atlanta "law group" as relationship managers, and Nathan Thorp and Christie Balmert come in as client-management associates.

Unique needs

"This is a growing market in Atlanta and one that needs the full attention of our highly credentialed professionals who are dedicated to serving the legal community," says Debbie Tyson, head of Wachovia's legal-specialty team in Atlanta. "With the increasing complexity of their business, law firms and attorneys have unique needs that require custom solutions."

Diekroeger joins Wachovia's legal-firm business from the mainstream of the Charlotte, N.C.-based bank's wealth-management division. Ledford and Balmert were already working at Wachovia as well; Ledford as a small-business financial specialist. Thorp was with Nashville, Tenn.-based First Horizon Bank before coming to Wachovia.

The biggest U.S. markets for advice to lawyers are New York, Atlanta, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, Miami, Charlotte, N.C., and Los Angeles, according to Wachovia. The bank has legal-specialty group in each of these cities save Los Angeles -- and it plans to open one in that city this year.

Wachovia's wealth-management services also include family-office support, consulting on family governance and stewardship, and marine and aircraft financing. Its open-architecture investment platform includes traditional and alternative investments such as private-equity and hedge funds.

Wachovia is the second-largest bank in metropolitan Atlanta, with a 19% market share, 215 offices and $21.6 billion in deposits. -FWR

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