What RIA principals in the Focus Financial family have to say about a rumored deal for the consolidator
Buckingham/BAM, The Colony Group and LLBH leaders see it as business as usual that Summit would want to roll over ownership of its stake
Related Moves
With RIA valuations ticking down and successions ticking up, Focus Financial deep sixes 'drunken sailor' pause, forgoes buyback plan and adds a CEO
CEO Rudy Adolf sees a 'softening' in multiples after a couple of frothy years when CI Financial dominated headlines and big RIA deals
August 13, 2022 at 12:39 AM
Looking past Covid-19 pandemic, Louisiana RIA buys $1-million building after hitting $1 billion in AUM and hiring the town's mayor
Summit Financial Wealth Advisors was sold to Focus Financial in 2014, growing its assets by $400 million since then but keeping staffing about the same
December 17, 2020 at 3:02 AM
Michael Kitces and Adam Birenbaum are now on the same $50-billion Buckingham team after the blogger called the young CEO with a multi-pronged proposal
Kitces is leaving Pinnacle - after 17 years - for fewer conflicts and more opportunity
March 12, 2020 at 1:45 PM
BAM Advisor Services
TAMP
Top Executive: Mont Levy
Stephen Winks
Focus’s stregnth is its weakness—every advisor is a free agent and very sucessful. The weakness is it is not possible to create scale, advance innovation, enhance the advisors value proposition, drive down cost, or create a brand as everyone is an independent free agent—thus, its achilles heel. Its impressive critical mass achieved accrues little value added for its acquired firms as an operating entity.
SCW
Chris
This is simple, word is that Focus owns an estimated $22M in EBITDA and they have $175 in debt and $80 million in preferred stock which leaves very little room for equity shareholders. That is a heavy cap table. I agree with SCM’s view, but regardless of them owning a non-controlling interest in an amalgamation of disparate firms their cap table is a joke. In an environment where The Mutual Fund Store and Edelman traded a very rich multiples and Summit has been shopping their piece hard for over a year suggests their is no bid.
