Bank of America Private Bank sets its minimum at $3 million in investable assets, and the depth of service you receive scales up from there, with certain investment strategies requiring $5 million or more in combined assets at Merrill and Bank of America.1Bank of America. What We Offer Meeting the dollar threshold is only the first step. Every prospective client must also clear a formal identity check and source-of-wealth review before an account is opened.
The Asset Tiers That Determine What You Get
The published entry point is $3 million in investable assets.1Bank of America. What We Offer That figure generally counts brokerage accounts, managed portfolios, and certain deposits. It does not count the equity in your primary residence.
Access broadens as your balances rise:
- $3 million. Entry into the Private Bank. You get a Private Client Advisor and a Private Banker, plus access to the core investment platform.
- $5 million. Access to the bank’s premium alternative investment strategies, including select hedge funds and private equity, requires at least $5 million in combined assets held at Merrill and Bank of America.2Bank of America. Merrill and Bank of America Private Bank Launch New Alternative Investment Strategies
- $10 million. The same premium alternative menu also opens for clients with over $10 million in total investable assets, including accounts held elsewhere.3Bank of America. Premium Access Strategies – Enhanced Portfolio Management
- $20 million. Trust and fiduciary services require $20 million in combined assets at Merrill and Bank of America, N.A. At this level, the bank assigns a larger senior team that includes specialists in estate law, tax strategy, and private credit.2Bank of America. Merrill and Bank of America Private Bank Launch New Alternative Investment Strategies
The tiers effectively decide the seniority of your relationship manager and how many specialists sit on your team. A client at $3 million has a capable advisor. A client at $20 million has a coordinated group whose job is to keep the tax planning, investment strategy, lending, and estate work fitting together.
How the Private Bank Differs From Merrill Lynch
Both Bank of America Private Bank and Merrill Lynch Wealth Management sit under the Global Wealth and Investment Management umbrella, but they target different clients. Merrill Lynch Wealth Management starts at $250,000 in investable assets and delivers guidance through individual financial advisors.1Bank of America. What We Offer The Private Bank targets ultra-high-net-worth clients and operates on a dedicated team model rather than a single-advisor relationship.
The two are connected in practice. Merrill Lynch advisors frequently refer clients who’ve grown past the $3 million mark into the Private Bank, so the move tends to be a transition rather than a fresh start. Private Bank clients, in turn, can tap Bank of America Securities for capital markets advice or IPO planning, and receive elevated consumer banking perks through Bank of America, N.A.
What Happens Before the Account Opens
Getting into the Private Bank is more involved than opening a brokerage or checking account. It typically starts with a referral from a Merrill Lynch advisor or direct contact with the Private Bank, followed by a confidential meeting with a Private Client Advisor who reviews your financial profile.
Identity Verification and Source-of-Wealth Review
Federal rules require every bank to run a Customer Identification Program before opening any account. Under the Bank Secrecy Act’s implementing regulations, the bank must collect your name, date of birth, residential or business address, and a taxpayer identification number, or a passport and country of issuance for non-U.S. persons.4eCFR. 31 CFR 1020.220 – Customer Identification Program Requirements for Banks
For a Private Bank account, this goes deeper than a retail experience. The bank verifies the source of your wealth, the nature of any business activities, and the origin of funds being transferred in. You’ll produce government identification, evidence of tax residency, and corporate or trust documents for any entities involved. The review isn’t negotiable, and it can take several weeks in complex situations, particularly when wealth originates from multiple countries or business structures.
Team Assignment
Once approved, you’re assigned a multi-disciplinary team. At minimum this includes a Private Client Advisor who quarterbacks the relationship and a Private Banker who handles day-to-day banking needs. Depending on your asset level and what you need, specialists in investments, trust administration, and credit are added. A dedicated onboarding manager handles asset transfers from prior custodians and the initial advisory, banking, and trust agreements, which spell out the fee structure, scope of services, and the legal framework of the relationship.
What the Minimum Buys You
Investment Management
Clients gain access to alternative investments that aren’t offered through retail channels, including curated hedge funds, private equity funds, and private real estate strategies, subject to the $5 million or $10 million thresholds noted above.3Bank of America. Premium Access Strategies – Enhanced Portfolio Management The firm’s Chief Investment Office produces proprietary research and vets third-party managers, feeding into custom portfolios that account for your risk tolerance and liquidity needs. Portfolios can incorporate tax-loss harvesting, asset location across taxable and tax-deferred accounts, and concentrated stock management for clients with large single-position exposures.
Specialized Lending
Private Bank lending doesn’t look like a consumer loan process. The flagship product is a securities-based line of credit, where a portion of your managed portfolio serves as collateral. You get liquidity without having to sell appreciated securities and trigger a capital gains bill. These lines are “non-purpose,” so the proceeds can fund almost anything except buying more securities.
The main risk is the maintenance requirement. If the market value of your pledged securities drops enough that your loan balance exceeds the bank’s maintenance threshold, you’ll face a collateral call. If you don’t meet it, the bank can liquidate securities from your portfolio without your permission, and that can force sales at the bottom of a decline. Anyone using one of these lines should stress-test their portfolio against a 30% to 40% drawdown and confirm they could meet a call without forced selling.
The Private Bank also handles specialized mortgages for second homes, properties held in trust structures, and high-value primary residences that exceed conventional lending limits. For business owners, the relationship connects to the firm’s capital markets and investment banking resources, including pre-liquidity planning for a business sale.
Trust and Fiduciary Services
The fiduciary platform is what separates the Private Bank from wealth managers that only handle investments, though remember the $20 million combined-asset floor for these services. Trust and fiduciary work is delivered through Bank of America, N.A. and U.S. Trust Company of Delaware. The bank does not act in a fiduciary capacity with respect to all products and services, but where fiduciary duties apply, it is legally required to act solely in your best interests.5Bank of America Private Bank. The Fiduciary Standard – What Is It and Key Details
Bank of America is the largest provider of managed personal trust services in the country, with $108 billion under management as of September 2025.6Bank of America Private Bank. Trust and Estate Services and Solutions for Individuals and Families It can serve as corporate trustee, executor, or custodian, and administers complex structures including grantor retained annuity trusts, dynasty trusts, and generation-skipping trusts.
How Fees Work
The primary charge is a percentage of assets under management, billed quarterly. It covers advisory services, research, portfolio management, trade execution, and reporting within managed accounts. The rate depends on asset size and is negotiable. Industry norms for portfolios in the Private Bank’s range typically fall between 0.50% and 1.00% annually, declining as assets increase, but Bank of America does not publish a standard fee schedule.
Not everything falls under the AUM fee. Trades executed outside a managed advisory program may carry per-transaction commissions on stocks, options, or bonds. Trust administration has its own fee, usually a percentage of trust assets under administration or a flat annual charge. Complex one-time projects such as a comprehensive estate plan or a tax restructuring may be billed as a fixed project fee. The specifics live in the advisory and trust agreements you sign at onboarding, so read them before signing.
Insurance Limits to Keep in Mind at These Balances
Private Bank clients routinely hold balances well beyond standard insurance limits, and the coverage doesn’t scale up automatically with the size of your relationship.
Cash deposits at Bank of America, N.A. are insured by the FDIC up to $250,000 per depositor, per ownership category.7FDIC.gov. Understanding Deposit Insurance Ownership categories include single accounts, joint accounts, certain retirement accounts, and trust accounts. Someone who holds a single account, a joint account with a spouse, and a revocable trust account at the same bank receives $250,000 of coverage in each category. If you have $3 million or more in deposits, structuring across ownership categories and across institutions may be needed to stay fully insured.
Securities and cash held in brokerage accounts through Merrill are protected by the Securities Investor Protection Corporation up to $500,000, including a $250,000 limit for cash, if the brokerage firm fails financially.8SIPC. What SIPC Protects SIPC does not cover investment losses, bad advice, or declines in market value. Merrill Lynch carries supplemental “excess SIPC” coverage through a Lloyd’s of London syndicate that adds protection per customer, including up to $1.9 million for cash, subject to an aggregate loss limit of $1 billion across all customer claims. Even those supplemental limits may not cover the full value of a large client’s holdings, which is one reason the Private Bank emphasizes diversification across custodians and asset types.