Janney opens Houston office with $3.5B Raymond James team

Janney Montgomery Scott is opening a Houston office anchored by the Edward Fitzpatrick Group. The team spent about 23 years at Raymond James, where it built $3.3 billion in client assets under management, according to BrokerCheck and the announcement.

The group’s $3.3 billion plus financial advisor Lance Murphy’s more than $200 million at Raymond James brings the total to roughly $3.5 billion. Murphy is leaving Raymond James for the team.

The team is led by managing directors and investment leads Sean Fitzpatrick and James “Jim” Edwards, and includes financial advisor Christin Simon and Allison Spinelli, a vice president of investments and senior registered private client associate.

Fitzpatrick said the team weighed “the platforms, cultures and capabilities available to us” and that Janney “stood out for the combination of personal attention and sophisticated resources.” He said leadership was accessible and took the time to understand the business.

Frank Amigo, Janney's Gulf regional director, said Texas “presents tremendous opportunity for Janney” and that opening Houston with this group “gives us an outstanding foundation in the market.” He cited the advisors' “deep experience, strong client relationships and established practices.”

Houston is the kind of team-level lift that has displaced advisor-by-advisor recruiting at the top of the market: a firm buys an established book and, often, a market footprint in the same move. Raymond James, which this publication has covered on both sides of the recruiting round-robin, supplies the book here; Janney gets a Houston office it can staff around five named professionals.