Former UBS financial services broker Craig Findley and his team have partnered with Dynasty Financial Partners to form an independent wealth management firm called Venture Visionary Partners, according to a news release.
He was most recently a managing director of the Touchstone Wealth Partners group at UBS, which he co-founded. He has over 24 years’ experience in wealth management, and was a Barron’s Top 1,200 Financial Advisor for 10 years, and appeared on the Forbes Best in State Wealth Advisors List for 2018 and 2019, according to the release.
His new RIA, Toledo, Ohio-based Venture Visionary Partners, has $1.5 billion in client assets. The firm works with high-net-worth families and business owners and provides financial planning, wealth management, family office and corporate services. The firm has a staff of 11 professionals.
The newest hires, all from Touchstone, are Robert Retzloff as chief operating officer. He previously was account vice president for financial advisor services at UBS.
Brian Funkhouser was tapped as investments/retirement plan consulting. He previously was a senior vice president of wealth management and senior retirement plan consultant at UBS.
John O’Brien, the firm's director of retirement plan consulting, was a senior retirement plan consultant and senior wealth strategy associate at UBS.
“We are excited to launch Venture Visionary Partners because we want to serve our clients as independent advisors. We will now be able to evaluate decisions from a different perspective and seek out optimal solutions, regardless of where the solutions reside,” Findley said in a prepared statement.
In the spring, UBS reported that it dismissed Findley firm policy violations "including, but not limited to, those involving training, outside activities and reporting of business travel" and that the violations were not related to sales or clients, according to BrokerCheck.
Findley responded with the followint statement:
“I acknowledge that I violated firm policy when I failed to [advise] management that my assistant had taken a training module for me. However, I did not intentionally violate firm policy nor was I ever warned, put on heightened supervision or subject to any type of progressive discipline for this action."