Benchmark Bank has launched a private wealth management division, led by Wayne McCullough and Keith Beckman.

Benchmark Bank has launched a private wealth management division, led by Wayne McCullough and Keith Beckman.

Rawles Bell – latterly a financial advisor at RBC Wealth Management - will join Beckman and McCullough as an associate director and client advisor at Benchmark Private Wealth Management.

Benchmark, led by chief executive and chairman Mike Barnett, is a community bank with offices in Dallas, University Park, Plano and Austin, TX.

Beckman is currently senior vice president and director of special projects at Benchmark Bank and will become a managing partner of the new private wealth management unit.

Before joining Benchmark, Beckman was a senior vice president at CSG Investments, a portfolio manager at Highland Capital Management and a senior analyst at Richmond Investment Advisors.

McCullough, meanwhile, will serve as a managing partner and president of Benchmark Private Wealth Management, having formerly been managing director at Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors. In that role, he was responsible for the firm’s sales and marketing efforts focused on high net worth, family office and certain institutional relationships. Prior to Kayne Anderson, McCullough was a private wealth management specialist at Deutsche Bank.

The news comes after the inaugural Fidelity Bank Wealth Management Study suggested that the fee-based nature of wealth management, among other factors, is causing many banks who are “repositioning for growth” to view the sector as a compelling business line.