Data & Research March 31, 2023

Women Who Work With Financial Professionals Feel More Prepared for Retirement

Separately, CFP launches an endowed scholarship to cultivate more female financial advisers.

Reported by


New LIMRA research indicates women who worked with a financial professional expressed more readiness for retirement than those who did not. Meanwhile, the influential financial professional group Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards Inc. announced a new program it hopes will broaden diversity among financial advisers.

A 2022 survey from Edelman Financial Engines found that 82% of employees prefer to work with a financial adviser from a similar background and who shares common values, and 2013 data from an Insured Retirement Institute study says 70 percent of women prefer to work with female advisers. The CFP Board aims to cultivate a new generation of female financial professionals.

Never miss a story — sign up for PLANADVISER newsletters to keep up on the latest retirement plan adviser news.

The LIMRA study, Impact of Financial Professionals on Retirement Security, surveyed Americans ages 40 to 85 who had household investable assets of $100,000 or more. The research, conducted in 2022, investigated how working with a financial professional affected people’s decisions about money and investment.

Of the women who reported receiving financial advising, 40% said they felt prepared for retirement, compared to 27% of women without advising who reported feeling prepared, according to the LIMRA research. Women advised by a financial professional were more likely to carry out important planning activities for retirement. Notably, 50% of women with an adviser estimated how many years their assets and investments would last in retirement, while only 36% of counterparts without advisers did the same, according to LIMRA.

Interestingly, women not working with a financial professional were slightly more likely to determine their health care coverage in retirement and determine what their social security benefits would be at different retirement ages.

Yet one-quarter of advised women had a formal written retirement plan, while 10% of unadvised women had one. Written plans lead to higher levels of confidence levels and a greater probability of purchasing an annuity, previous LIMRA research found.

Of women who work with a financial professional, 52% said they were interested in converting a portion of their assets into a lifetime-guaranteed annuity in retirement, eight percentage points more than women who did not work with a professional.


WIN Endowed Scholarship Program

To attract more female financial professionals who might make women more likely to consider working with a financial adviser, the CFP Board Center for Financial Planning announced on Tuesday the launch of the WIN Endowed Scholarship program.

The scholarship recognizes the 10th anniversary of the CFP Board’s Women’s Initiative, or WIN, which seeks to address the underrepresentation of women in the financial planner workforce.

Qualified students will be awarded up to $5,000 to complete an undergraduate-level or a certificate-level CFP Board-Registered program. After the scholarship recipient has completed the required coursework, they will be eligible to take the CFP exam and pursue the next steps to attain CFP certification.

“By becoming financial planners, women can empower themselves and other women to take control of their finances and achieve financial independence,” said Kevin Keller, the CFP Board’s CEO, in a statement. “They can help educate women about financial literacy, investment strategies and retirement planning, which can be particularly valuable in a society where women often face financial challenges and inequalities. The WIN Endowed Scholarship program will help to ensure that talented and motivated women have the support they need to pursue a career in financial planning and earn their CFP certification.”

Deals & People March 31, 2023

Merrill Wealth Management Head Sieg Departs for Citi

The wealth leader returns to his former employer to focus on driving more “fee-based revenue.”

Reported by

Andy Sieg, president of Merrill Wealth Management and a member of Bank of America’s senior leadership team, is leaving the firm to head Citigroup Inc.’s wealth division, the firms announced Thursday.

The wealth management head, who was with Merrill for about six years, will be returning to Citi, where he was a managing director in its global wealth management division until 2009. He left to join what was then known as Merrill Lynch as head of global wealth and retirement solutions and took the role of wealth management head from John Thiel in 2017.

“This is a fantastic opportunity to build a leading wealth management business at the world’s most global bank at a time of massive wealth creation worldwide,” Sieg said in a statement. “There is a transformation underway at Citi, and I am excited about becoming part of a team that’s driven to deliver for clients, colleagues and shareholders.”

Sieg will take a six-month leave before starting the role, as per terms of his Bank of America contract, according to Citi. Jim O’Donnell will continue as Citi’s head of global wealth management until Sieg starts in September.

Never miss a story — sign up for PLANADVISER newsletters to keep up on the latest retirement plan adviser news.

Once he takes up his new post in the fall, Sieg will report to Citi CEO Jane Fraser, according to a letter sent to Citi employees. Fraser became CEO in 2021, taking the role from Michael Corbat after serving as president and head of global consumer banking.

“Andy’s decision to join Citi sends a strong signal about the potential of our Wealth proposition and the attractiveness of our unique global offering,” Fraser wrote in the letter. “Growing Wealth is a core pillar of our strategy and will improve our business mix by adding more fee-based revenue and drive improved returns.”

Bank of America announced that Lindsay Hans and Eric Schimpf have been appointed presidents and co-heads of Merrill Wealth Management, reporting to Bank of America Chair and CEO Brian Moynihan. Hans and Schimpf will join Bank of America’s executive management team and oversee more than 25,000 Merrill employees and client balances of about $2.8 trillion.

Hans joined Bank of America in 2014 and was head of Merrill’s private wealth management, international and institutional business. Schimpf began his career as a Merrill financial adviser in 1994 and was most recently division executive for the Pacific Coast.

The move marks the second time Sieg will leave Merrill for Citi, which he did in 2005 after a 12-year stint at the investment firm as a managing director. That move came before the New York-based wealth management firm was acquired by Bank of America in 2008 during the financial crisis. Before his first stint at Merrill, Sieg had served as an economic and domestic policy aide in the administration of President George H. W. Bush.

Merrill Wealth management reported client balances of $2.8 billion in its fourth-quarter 2022 earnings, with $1.1 trillion in assets under management. The wealth management arm also reported adding 8,500 new households, up 27% in the quarter for its best Q4 results ever.

Citi’s global wealth management arm reported a drop in revenue of 6% to $1.7 billion in Q4 2022, citing investment product revenue headwinds, which the firm said were offset by net interest income growth from higher interest rates.

«