Bank of America shares close higher on Thursday, 600 new Merrill Edge offices to be added in the next two years

According to an announcement by Bank of America Corporation (BAC) on Thursday, in an attempt to expand its wealth management services for mainstream investors, it intends to open as many as 600 new Merrill Edge offices and hire 300 new financial solutions advisers within the upcoming two years. The new recruits will bring the total number of brokers to approximately 4 000, the bank said.

Bank of America shares closed higher for the second time in the past nine trading sessions on Thursday. The stock went up 2.04% ($0.60) to $29.99, with the intraday high and the intraday low being at $30.14 and $29.32 respectively.

In the week ended on March 25th the shares of the financial holding company lost 9.33% of their market value compared to a week ago, which marked a second consecutive period of decrease. It has also been the worst performance since the week ended on January 10th 2016.

The stock has pared its loss to 6.57% so far during the current month, following a 0.31% increase in February. The latter has been a sixth straight month of gains.

For the entire past year, Bank of America shares rose 33.57% following another 31.31% surge in 2016.

The new Merrill Edge centers are to be set up in existing branches of the bank as well as in new offices at locations such as Lexington, Kentucky and Cleveland, Indianapolis.

The Merrill Edge division is focused primarily on customers with assets of up to $250 000. At present, the unit manages $184.5 billion in assets and 2.4 million accounts.

According to CNN Money, the 30 analysts, offering 12-month forecasts regarding Bank of America’s stock price, have a median target of $35.00, with a high estimate of $37.00 and a low estimate of $22.00. The median estimate is a 16.71% surge compared to the closing price of $29.99 on March 29th.

The same media also reported that 17 out of 32 surveyed investment analysts had rated Bank of America’s stock as “Buy”, while 9 – as “Hold”. On the other hand, 1 analyst had recommended selling the stock.

Daily and Weekly Pivot Levels

With the help of the Camarilla calculation method, todays levels of importance for the Bank of America stock are presented as follows:

R1 – $30.07
R2 – $30.14
R3 (Range Resistance – Sell) – $30.22
R4 (Long Breakout) – $30.44
R5 (Breakout Target 1) – $30.70
R6 (Breakout Target 2) – $30.83

S1 – $29.91
S2 – $29.84
S3 (Range Support – Buy) – $29.76
S4 (Short Breakout) – $29.54
S5 (Breakout Target 1) – $29.28
S6 (Breakout Target 2) – $29.15

By using the traditional method of calculation, the weekly levels of importance for Bank of America Corporation (BAC) are presented as follows:

Central Pivot Point – $30.22
R1 – $31.40
R2 – $33.62
R3 – $34.80
R4 – $35.97

S1 – $28.00
S2 – $26.82
S3 – $24.60
S4 – $22.37