BNY Mellon Wealth Management has hired Christopher McDermott as senior director for business development in Palm Beach Gardens, FL.

BNY Mellon Wealth Management has hired Christopher McDermott as senior director for business development in Palm Beach Gardens, FL.

With a background in asset management, McDermott joins BNY Mellon as part of the firm’s previously-announced plan to increase its wealth management sales team by 50 per cent and add a number of portfolio managers and private bankers by year-end 2014. In the past year the wealth manager has added six new business development professionals in Florida alone.

McDermott reports to managing director Tim Goering, who is head of sales in Florida.

He was latterly a financial advisor at AllianceBernstein in West Palm Beach, before which he was a co-founder and senior managing director at Bond Street Holdings, a bank holding company that created Florida Community Bank. Previously, he worked on Wall Street in a variety of investment and credit analysis roles.

Yesterday, BNY Mellon Wealth Management hired Thomas Ryan as senior director for business development in Seattle, where he reports to regional president Jim Barnyak. And in related news, last week the firm appointed Trevor Hunt as vice president for business development for the firm's Advisory Services business in Toronto.