Morgan Stanley Mega-Producer Roger Coleman Resigns
After abruptly taking a leave of absence from his multi-billion dollar practice at Morgan Stanley’s office in Garden City, New York, two weeks ago, Roger Coleman resigned on Tuesday, a company spokesman said.
As previously reported, Coleman left his office Christmas week amid reports from colleagues that he was forced into a leave of absence for compliance-related reasons. In a phone call with AdvisorHub that week, Coleman, 54, said he was taking time off to be with his family because his father-in-law was gravely ill. Pressed on the issue, he said he also was considering retiring because he has been working as an adviser for 33 years.
Jim Wiggins, a company spokesman, dismissed as “complete hogwash” reports that Coleman left because of improprieties related to an ongoing $30 million arbitration against Morgan Stanley brought by former members of Coleman’s team.
read more: Morgan Stanley: “Resumes Are Being Printed All Over the Place”
“He had a very large practice, and he’s retiring,” said Wiggins, citing a memo from Coleman’s complex manager Jeff Reiss.
Though Coleman began his career as a clerk matching buy-and-sell orders at a small firm near his hometown on Long Island, he ended it with high acclaim. He has ranked as one of “Barron’s” Top 100 Financial Advisors since at least 2010, often placing in its Top 10, as measured by assets under management, revenue and customer satisfaction, among other qualities.
He was in the Top 10 again in “Barron’s” 2015 list, and was lauded by “Wealth Management” magazine as its top “Wirehouse Advisor of the Year” in October.
Coleman’s team, which includes 29 other advisers, according to a Morgan Stanley website, administers about $27 billion of client assets, according to his accolades.
In addition to sharing books of business with several “partners” on his team, Coleman has a major business advising corporate executives on stock option and other awards. “The coverage team will remain unchanged for his clients” in both the corporate stock ownership program and his general client book, spokesman Wiggins said.
Coleman did not return calls to his cellphone for comment. Several members of his team said they could not comment on their plans. Reiss, the complex manager, did not immediately return a call for comment.
Coleman worked early in his career at Kidder, Peabody and Prudential-Bache Securities before joining Citigroup’s Smith Barney in July 1989, according to the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority’s BrokerCheck listing. He migrated to Morgan Stanley in June 2009 as part of its acquisition of Smith Barney.
NEXT: Cetera’s Parent to File for Bankruptcy
