They don't think it makes sense for Merrill Lynch to be buying Advest or for Smith Barney to be adding Legg Mason. They fret over the quality of the remaining regionals and what that means for brokers' career options. They see richer recruitment deals--but only for advisers willing to sign on longer. They think Morgan Stanley will take the steps necessary to rebound.

Those are some points that emerge in our seventh annual recruiters' roundtable, which starts on the next page.

RENAISSANCE AT MORGAN STANLEY?

ON WALL STREET: What do you make of the new Morgan Stanley? Are they fixing what's wrong with their private client group?

MINDY DIAMOND, DIAMOND CONSULTANTS, CHESTER, N.J.: Morgan Stanley is doing a lot to correct its problems. They're bringing in James Gorman starting in February. They've hired this Drew Hawkins, who is the national director of recruiting. And John Mack, who was the originator of the deal between Morgan Stanley and Dean Witter, is really adamant about keeping the two firms together and fighting off any myths that it's going to be sold.

So the way I view Morgan Stanley and sell it is that right now it's high risk but high reward, and it's a great time to consider them.

MICHAEL KING, MICHAEL KING ASSOCIATES, NEW YORK: I'm surprised that the name Morgan Stanley is still a golden name to the public. Internally, I think we've been more aware of the problems than the public has been. I also think they're going to move to a smaller group of brokers and probably use a version of what Kidder, Peabody did--a more customer-services kind of approach for high-end. It'll become smaller, but I think it's going to become better.

GEORGE V. McGOUGH, HADLEY LOCKWOOD, N.Y.: Phil Purcell [the former Morgan Stanley chief executive who left last year] was a management consultant. He came in, he had a game plan, and he stayed with his game plan regardless of what the results were. That was a problem. If you look below that level at the regional manager's level, Dean Witter has some of the best branch managers that I deal with in the industry, a really talented group of people--who were quite frustrated during this transition and during some of the management problems. They all seem to be focusing now and going forward on this.

MICKEY WASSERMAN, MICHAEL WASSERMAN & ASSOCIATES, AGOURA HILLS, CALIF.: I see Morgan Stanley having a very tough road ahead of them, probably not coming out of this until early 2007 or maybe towards the end of 2007. Gorman coming in is great news. He was a great Merrill manager. But he himself said back in 2003 that if firms don't start going towards wealth management at that point in time, it might be too late. So he's got the toughest road ahead of him right now.

NICHOLAS FERBER, SANFORD BARROWS GROUP, HOLLYWOOD, FLA.: Gorman is wonderful for shareholders, but he's terrible for brokers. He's not liked at all. He didn't come from our industry, he wasn't a salesman, and I think he'll do the same thing he did at Merrill--which is to say he'll take down another 25% or 30% of the sales force. It will be good for profit and good for margins. But what it'll do to the culture, I don't know.

BELLWETHER MERRILL

ON WALL STREET: What kind of place is Merrill going to be without Gorman? Or to rephrase that: What kind of place is Merrill going to be under new head Bob McCann?

MICKEY WASSERMAN: Merrill almost runs itself. Whoever takes over--everything's in place at Merrill. I don't see that there's going to be much change at all from one management team to another.

ON WALL STREET: They've done two really big deals in recent months: the Japan merger and the one with Advest.

MICKEY WASSERMAN: Merrill had to buy Advest, because Smith Barney was right around the corner from them insofar as being the largest. That might have been some motivation for them to make a purchase like that.

RICH SCHWARZKOPF, SCHWARZKOPF RECRUITING SERVICES, NEW YORK: McCann, the head of retail at Merrill, came from AXA, and AXA owned Advest. I think it's going to be the worst takeover in recent history, actually. Whole Advest offices have departed--Portland, Maine, and whole offices. Everybody in this room has probably called tons of Advest brokers.