ON THE MOVE-RBC Wealth hires veteran team from Merrill Lynch

Oct 3 (Reuters) - RBC Wealth Management, a division of the Royal Bank of Canada , has expanded its broker force in Colorado with a veteran team of advisers from Bank of America's Merrill Lynch.

Advisers David Evans, Nepeta Godec and Patty Eckelberry joined RBC's Denver Tech office from Merrill, where they managed $177 million in client assets and generated about $1.2 million in revenue last year.

Evans, a 36-year industry veteran, had also previously worked at Wachovia and Dain Rauscher before Merrill, according to regulatory filings.

Dan Ball, RBC's Denver complex director, said the firm has had a lot more interest over the past few years from veteran advisers whose parent companies were affected by the 2008 financial crisis.

"RBC rose to be a firm that is stable and secure," Ball said in an interview on Wednesday. "Advisers and clients are looking for that."

RBC Wealth Management has more than $227 billion in client assets managed by nearly 2,000 advisers across the United States.

The firm also recently added another veteran Merrill team in California that managed $250 million in client assets.

With these new recruits, RBC has added at least 26 experienced advisers this year from major brokerages, including Merrill, Morgan Stanley Smith Barney and Wells Fargo Advisors. Those recruits managed more than $2 billion in client assets at their previous firms, based on moves tracked by Reuters.