Jim Atwood and Phil Scott leave JPMorgan to launch $18.6B RIA Latigo Peak

Jim Atwood and Phil Scott left JPMorgan Chase with roughly $18.6 billion in client assets and launched Latigo Peak Partners on Monday. The new RIA is headquartered in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., and opens with 48 professionals serving ultra-high-net-worth individuals and families. InvestmentNews reported the launch and described it as one of the largest wirehouse breakaways of recent years.

The pair ran two of the largest practices at JPMorgan Advisors, Atwood's practice in Boston and Scott's in Bellevue, Wash. Over the past six years they raised their combined revenue from $34 million to more than $130 million, according to the firm's launch announcement. As a registered investment adviser, Latigo Peak takes fees for advice rather than earning commissions as a broker.

Atwood told Bloomberg News that the bank's platform had become the constraint. "If you're working within one of these firms, you're confined to investment opportunities on their platform," he said. "It gets difficult to be as nimble as you want."

Atwood said the founders had opportunities to take private equity and passed, citing the five- or six-year exit horizons outside owners want and the operating views that come with them. Private equity backed 88% of RIA deals in 2025, according to a Fidelity Investments report cited by Bloomberg. PE-backed and PE-owned buyers accounted for 89% of RIA transactions in the first half of 2026, according to Fidelity's midyear figures. "Phil and I are backing this 100% ourselves," he told Bloomberg. "It's not cheap to do that."

Latigo Peak picked Charles Schwab and BNY Pershing for custody and lending, and Fusion Financial Partners advised on the design and launch of the RIA. InvestmentNews notes that Latigo Peak will use more than one custodian.

The two practices left together rather than one advisor at a time, the block-trade pattern this publication has tracked.