Merrill Lynch has opened an institutional fixed-income sales office in Nashville, Tenn., as part of an increased focus on middle-market clients. Bob Bozza, national head of fixed-income sales for middle markets in New York, said Merrill is looking to focus more on these investors, particularly in the bank and finance sector, and offers them full access to Merrill's institutional research and trading capabilities.
As part of the initiative, the firm recently added two salesmen from Morgan Keegan as fixed-income generalists. Middle-market sales tend to be performed on a generalist basis, to match the structure of the organizations that are investing and usually do not specialize as much as larger institutions do, Bozza explained. The recent hires are Rick Ruffin, senior v.p. of investments, and Patrick Aswad, first v.p. of investments. The new office was set up to accommodate the two and as an adjunct to an existing Merrill retail office. Bozza said Merrill is also on the lookout for an unspecified number of additional salesmen to complement its middle-market sales effort. Candidates should have strong existing relationships with investors, predominantly with financial institutions.