A gamble in the mid-1980s to leave the private family business has been paying dividends to wealth manager Greg DeLong.
The Morgan Stanley first vice president was raised in Jefferson City and started his career working under his father at DeLong’s Inc., a fabricator of structural steel products.
“I bring a unique blend of private business experience and formal business training to my job as a financial adviser,” DeLong says.
In August 1986, he began building a financial advising business from scratch. Nearly three decades later, DeLong was responsible for $214 million in assets under management at Edward Jones.
By comparison, the average U.S. financial adviser manages roughly $62 million in assets, according to a 2014 study by Fidelity Investments.
Among DeLong’s key accomplishments, he advised on about a dozen municipal bond issues, including the financing packages for Juanita K. Hammons Hall for the Performing Arts and other campus buildings at Missouri State University.
Earlier this year, DeLong rolled the dice again, leaving a 27-year run at Edward Jones to form The DeLong Group at Morgan Stanley. He’s joined by his son, financial adviser Chris DeLong, and Gina Ballenger and Carol Spunaugle, his longtime client service associates.
“My business is about trust. My clients trust me to work with their finances to manage risk, reward and cost, based on their individual objectives and risk tolerance,” he says, noting in the move, the team retained 90 percent of the assets managed with Edward Jones, compared to an industry average retention rate of 70 percent. “I relieve my clients of the stress and worry about their finances so they can focus on living their lives.”
DeLong continues to manage assets above $200 million, working mostly with individual investors to fund such life circumstances as putting children through college and passing wealth on to spouses. Among his clients is Jim Anderson, CoxHealth’s vice president of marketing and public affairs, who taught DeLong in a previous job in the Jefferson City school system.
“I have known Greg DeLong for some 40 years,” Anderson says. “(He) is an outstanding wealth manager and financial adviser. He knows and lives business success.”
DeLong also advises small-business owners on passing the baton – and keeping it in the family.
“I have helped several small-business owners transition their businesses to the next generation by providing portfolio management to the founder to produce retirement income in order for the successors to step in and manage the business,” DeLong says.
In the community, DeLong serves as chairman of Ozarks Technical Community College’s Board of Trustees and on the 2014 United Way campaign’s insurance and financial services division.
He also is an advisory board member for Ozark Greenways Inc., where he is a past-president, and for MSU’s department of finance and general business.[[In-content Ad]]
