A team of four private bankers from Merrill Lynch's private clients discretionary management team, are poised to join Schroders Private Banking, following their boss who left three weeks ago.

UK rival Schroders is being seen as a frontrunner to hire private bankers Rob Rydon, Tim Gibbons, Alex Roe and Graham Harrington, following the departure of Merrill's former head of discretionary management, Andrew Clark.