BOUNTIFUL—Mark Jessup knew he wanted to be in finance when as a 12-year-old he asked his father if he could buy 100 shares of stock in Nike. 

“He joked with me and said you don’t have the money to buy stock,” said Jessup. “But it was a teaching opportunity for later down the road through high school and college that maybe I have the skills to do this well.” 

The 35-year-old has built a career in finance and was recently named to the 2021 Forbes “Top Next-Generation Wealth Advisors” List.

“My grandfather started his career with Merrill Lynch in 1957,” said Jessup. “Then my father Ron Jessup joined him. I had two generations of great men that I respected and when I was 12 I decided that was the route I wanted to go in my career.”

That interest led him to focus on finance classes in high school and he worked as a client associate at Merrill Lynch his last year in high school before he served a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

He earned a degree in finance from the University of Utah and continued working at Merrill Lynch assisting in operational tasks. “I learned what it meant to serve the clients,” said Jessup. “A time came when I viewed that a job outside of Merrill would be good for my development and I was able to get a job at Goldman Sachs my last semester at the U.”

Jessup was hired as an analyst in the equity department of the Operation Division at Goldman Sachs.

“I gained quite a bit of experience in the inner workings of investments and hedge funds that was beneficial to my growth and development,” he said. “I spent another two years and had further growth in finance as a controller in the fixed income space of the Finance Division.”

After four years at Goldman Sachs, Jessup’s father asked him to consider coming back to work with him as a financial advisor for the Jessup Group, a division of Merrill Lynch Wealth Management. “It gave me a chance to partner with him and work alongside him to continue to learn in the industry,” said Jessup. “I felt like it was the right thing for us as a family to join back with him.”

While at Goldman, Jessup was invited to go to New York and work at the trading desk. “I realized how much I liked Utah and that it was where I wanted to raise my family and settle down and sink my roots deeply in the community I love.”

Jessup’s passion outside of work is his family. “I have a boy, a girl and a boy,” he said. “I look at them sometimes and wonder which one is going to succeed me.”

He’s also an avid cyclist and has participated in several races for charities. “We’re blessed here to have all the mountains and trails,” said Jessup. “I did six or seven races last year. I’ve been in the Bike for MS races. It gives me great fulfillment when I’m riding for a good cause.”

Jessup said working as an advisor is more than just giving clients financial advice. “I want to provide them help, not just in the financial world, but in their world outside.”

A strong moral compass is critical to succeed in this business, he said. “You have to genuinely care and actively listen. It all comes down to trust. That was important to my father and grandfather. They emulated doing the right thing for the right reason.”