Almost 46 per cent of the revenue received by Merrill Lynch's Global Wealth Management unit last year came from just 21 per cent of its top-producing brokers, about 2,500 people, according to copies of the reports reviewed by Reuters.

The monthly reports, available internally as a performance scorecard, demonstrate how the top one-fifth of advisors are far ahead of their peers, the firm, which is part of Bank of America, said. The story did not spell out, as far this publication could check, if all the advisors were from the US or from around the world.

The reports divide brokers into smaller groups and provide average revenue and compensation credit figures, which Reuters used to calculate take-home pay and estimated revenue for each group of brokers.

Last year, the top 2,400 brokers generated an average of $2.5 million each in revenue for Merrill, double the average of advisors in the next 20 per cent, who brought in $1.2 million each on average, according to a report that covered the full year.

The report comes against a background of predictions that the wire-house business model is under pressure in the US. They are losing share on the market for high net worth clients as other business models of wealth management like registered investment advisors prove more attractive and as people diversify their accounts, according to Cerulli Associates in a recent study. The share is expected to fall to 42 per cent in 2014 from 45 per cent in 2010, the report said. The largest firms, such as Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, Wells Fargo, and UBS, will see their share of the total market erode from a peak of 56 per cent in 2007.

Top-performers

As the Reuters report stated, the results demonstrate why top-performing advisors can command strong remuneration and are also eagerly courted by rivals as well as fledging businesses.

The report also points out – as also revealed by news items carried by this publication – that wealth management houses such as UBS have been hiring managers from Merrill Lynch. Reuters says that, according to its data, UBS has hired at least 28 brokers from Merrill in 2012.

About 4,500 advisors brought in an average of $1 million or more in revenue for the firm. Of those, about 1,450 brokers with 10 or more years of experience brought in more than $2 million. The average revenue brought in by all revenue-producing brokers was nearly $1.1 million. Top brokers likely got paid an average of nearly $1 million last year, about 22 times more than the lowest performers. Just 12 per cent of advisors - those in the top one-fifth of all brokers by revenue generation - with 10 or more years of experience accounted for an estimated 32 per cent of the wealth business's annual revenue.

The report added that Merrill Lynch has declined to comment.

Media reports say that Bank of America Merrill Lynch is looking to sell its non-US businesses but to date, the Wall Street-listed banking and wealth management giant has declined to comment.