Thomson Financial announced the results of its survey of the most-read brokerage firms and analysts in North America in the first quarter of 2002 on Wednesday.

Merrill Lynch captured the top position in both categories, with the firm overall and analyst Phua Young receiving the highest volume of readership by institutional investors in North America..

Merrill was followed by Salomon Smith Barney, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan. UBS Warburg, Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns, Banc of America Securities and ABN Amro round out the top 10.

Young was followed by fellow Merrill Lynch analyst Adam Quinton as the top most-read analysts, with a trio from Morgan Stanley filling out the top five, Kit Konolige, Simon Flannery, and Richard Bilotti.

The rankings are based on readership statistics compiled from First Call Insight, which captures the document retrievals of the more than 40,000 institutional money managers worldwide who subscribe to First Call Research Direct.

Two of First Call Research Direct’s third party distribution partners — ILX and FactSet — are also taken into account when these rankings are calculated.