Ex-Morgan Stanley exec forms advisory firm

A longtime financial adviser for wealthy families and institutions such as college and religious endowment funds has gone out on his own.

Phil Shaffer, formerly a managing director of Morgan Stanley Wealth Management locally and a co-founder of Morgan Stanley unit Graystone Consulting, has founded Halite Partners in Columbus.

The notion behind the firm is to provide clear investment information to clients without conflicts of interest, restricted investment offerings, high fees and old technology, the company said.

“We were founded to be able to give outstanding investment management without conflict for wealthy families and institutional investors,” Shaffer said.

The firm will serve families with assets of $5 million and up and, for institutional clients, $50 million to $500 million.

Shaffer, Halite’s CEO, spent 37 years working for large investment firms where he said too much focus is on the revenue that employees produce, the amount of assets they manage or the loans they made, and not enough on how well clients are doing.

Too often, clients are given a narrow list of investment choices that best benefit the firm, he said. While these conflicts are disclosed in brochures and government forms, they are hard to find and clients think they’re getting the best advice from their advisers.

Halite, instead, charges a fee based on the size of their portfolio.

The company chose the name Halite, also known as rock salt, because of the transparency of rock salt and because it is used as a preservative and flavor enhancer.

“We think there should be transparency with all fees and all costs with anything we do,” he said.

Shaffer and partners Norm Cook and Lee Caleshu have a team of nine so far working out of temporary offices in Upper Arlington. Several have come from Morgan Stanley.

Eventually, there will be a staff of 15 to 20 with permanent offices in the Easton area, Shaffer said.

In addition to Columbus, the firm has an office in West Palm Beach, Florida, with plans for another office in Naples, Florida.

The company’s board includes former Ohio State men’s basketball coach Thad Matta; Jim Davlin, former vice president of finance and treasurer for General Motors; and Jonathan Hook, former chief investment officer at Ohio State.