Merrill Lynch Global Wealth Management has recently recruited financial advisor Floyd Jordan from Smith Barney for its Stuart, Florida office.

While at Smith Barney, Citigroup’s retail brokerage arm, Mr Jordan and his team managed $500 million in client assets and had $3 million in trailing 12-month production.

Merrill has been visibly ramping up its recruitment recently, and is thought to be offering one of the highest remuneration packages in the industry in its efforts to lure the biggest-hitting advisors from its rivals.

Last week came news that Merrill had recruited a raft of multi-million dollar teams from Smith Barney, Wells Fargo and UBS for offices across the US. In these raids, Smith Barney was hardest hit, losing eight advisors to Merrill. Among the defectors were Bruce Micheel and Marc Gamberdella, who prior to joining Merrill’s Santa Barbara, California office, had managed £250 million in client assets at Smith Barney.