Fired BNY Advisor Claims Age Discrimination

What You Need to Know

The advisor alleges a manager made ageist remarks and dismissed him despite his consistently strong performance.
A manager’s three oldest direct reports were dismissed on the same day, the lawsuit says.
The company told news media that it planned to lay off 1,500 workers while investing in young talent.

A longtime Bank of New York financial advisor has accused the institution of age discrimination in firing him, denying him an annual bonus and downgrading his performance rating.

Timothy Barker, 67, a managing director and family wealth investment advisor at BNY for more than 12 years, alleges in a lawsuit filed Monday in U.S. District Court in New York that the financial services giant violated federal, state and New York City age-discrimination laws.

“A stellar performer, he often ranked at or near the top of all (family wealth investment advisors) nationwide as to a number of performance metrics and serviced some of BNY’s largest and most complex clients,” the complaint contends.

But when Barker was 65 — ”after one of his supervisors began making ageist comments about another employee in his mid-sixties” — BNY began treating him “differently, and worse,” than much younger FWIAs, the suit contends.

The bank then downgraded Barker’s performance rating, denied him an annual bonus, and in 2023 terminated his employment because of his age, he contends.

In July, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission issued Barker a reasonable-cause finding and right-to-sue notice, according to the lawsuit.

Barker, an investment professional and attorney, provided tax, financial planning and investment advice to high-net-worth individuals and families for more than 40 years, his lawsuit says.

Before joining BNY in 2011, he worked as a senior investment advisor at US Trust Company, First Republic Bank and Ayco/Goldman Sachs, according to the suit.

At BNY, Barker analyzed and provided asset allocation and portfolio recommendations to individual, family, endowment and charitable trust clients with more than $20 million in assets under management, including some of the largest and most complex clients, he contends.

Barker, who served on BNY’s private equity investment committee and regional investment committee, consistently garnered annual performance ratings of “exceeded” or “met” expectations and was consistently awarded significant annual incentive compensation, the complaint contends.

BNY in 2021 appointed a new regional president to whom Barker reported, and this executive soon showed an ageist bias, referring to a 67-year-old wealth strategist as a “white-haired guy trying to look young,” the lawsuit contends.