Reporting to Geoffrey Bruyn, the firm’s market leader for the Netherlands, Duschka will focus on advising Dutch entrepreneurial clients.

Duschka was latterly with ABN Amro Mees Pierson in Rotterdam, most recently  as a private trading specialist covering high net worth individuals and earlier as a senior investment advisory, also for HNW clients.

For 2010 the global wealth and investment management arm of Bank of America, Merrill Lynch’s parent, logged a $369 million year-on-year drop in net income to $1.347 billion. The bank said the drop was caused by higher non-interest expenses and the tax-related effect from the sale of the Columbia long-term asset management business, partially offset by higher non-interest income and lower credit costs.