From a technology standpoint, brokers at Bank of America Corp. are sitting pretty.
The bank's acquisition of Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc. of New York means that they will have access to workstations with features that the bank hasn't provided to its brokers.
With a few mouse clicks, they will be able to generate a list of accounts that hold a specific security, review asset allocations and group accounts by family, among other features.
That functionality and the profitability of registered representatives at Merrill Lynch make it likely that Bank of America of Charlotte, N.C., will give its roughly 3,000 brokers Merrill workstations, said Alois Pirker, an analyst with Aite Group of Boston.
"Merrill brokers are very productive, and ultimately, BofA is not going to touch the well-oiled machine that is the Merrill brokerage system," he said.
HEFTY PRICE TAG
Merrill Lynch spent $1 billion developing its wealth management workstation over the past four years, according to some estimates.
The system was built in collaboration with Thomson Reuters of New York using the Thomson One desktop with a great deal of customization for Merrill Lynch's registered reps.
It is reportedly so well-integrated that advisers have a difficult time recognizing where Thomson One ends and Merrill Lynch begins.
By contrast, Banc of America Investment Services Inc. brokers lack a comparable system. They make do with the StreetScape system from the company's custodian, National Financial Services LLC of Boston.
However, that system doesn't offer the flexibility to sort through and filter client holdings and accounts, benefits that Merrill Lynch's system provides.
Another important difference is that Bank of America brokers' desktop is fixed, but Merrill Lynch advisers can customize the look of their desktop to fit their business.
"I have my computer set up so that when I log-in in the morning I have my business links on one side of the screen and e-mail on the other. I can immediately see yesterday's book of business," said one longtime Merrill Lynch broker who asked not to be identified.
In addition, this broker said that he can see how much money left accounts and how much money is due to come in, watch the activity in accounts and read Dow Jones Newswires and Thomson Reuters, both of New York, to stay up-to-date on financial news.
"There are a lot of bells and whistles in it that [remind] you to call people, and that makes you more proactive," said another Merrill Lynch rep who also asked not to be identified.
Reps can enter data once and populate several applications effortlessly. For instance, brokers can migrate from the customer relationship management system to Merrill Lynch's portfolio management system, the Morningstar Adviser Workstation from Morningstar Inc. of Chicago, with a few keystrokes.
A broker going from Bank of America's CRM package to its Streetscape portfolio management application would have to cut and paste the data from one application to another.
Another major convenience of the Merrill Lynch workstation is that data can be filtered based on individual holdings within an account or used to generate a list of clients who haven't received financial planning services. Brokers at Bank of America can't create these types of lists.
Merrill Lynch reps can easily create customized portfolio reports for clients that display holdings by account, asset allocations, portfolio performances and account balances.
Brokers at the bank have equivalent report-generating capabilities, but they are more difficult to use, and the reports contain less detailed information.
Moreover, while Bank of America brokers have a CRM system that is part of StreetScape, or they have access to the bank's internal CRM system that was built by San Mateo, Calif.-based Seibel Systems Inc., both systems are rigid and don't allow brokers to customize their screens and create fields.
However, many leads and referrals that Bank of America brokers receive have come from the bank side of the business. As a result, they haven't required a flexible system. But those needs might change as a result of the Merrill Lynch acquisition.
Merrill Lynch's reps have access to a customized version of Salesforce.com from Salesforce.com Inc. of San Francisco, which supports their entrepreneurial approach to the business. They can add any fields they want to, even sorting data to create a list of clients who enjoy playing golf.
While advisers at both firms can select the financial planning software they prefer, brokers at Merrill Lynch are provided with an abundance of tools including Financeware from Financeware Inc. of Richmond, Va.
In addition, they have a homegrown tool called Financial 360° that provides the adviser with a single-screen summary of a client's financial picture, including their portfolio balance, as well as the ability to analyze holdings. Bank of America brokers can select the planning software that they prefer and load it themselves, though in some cases, the software is provided to them.
In the end, Bank of America brokers should be far happier with their technology than they are now.
"There was a lot of pent-up frustration with the bank among the BofA brokers because the bank didn't want to spend any money on them or their technology," said a former BofA executive who asked not to be identified. "They never had access to bleeding-edge stuff."
Matthew Card, spokesman for Bank of America, and Selena Morris, spokeswoman for Merrill Lynch, declined to comment.
E-mail Davis D. Janowski at djanowski@investmentnews.com.
