5 recent wealth management M&A deals to note so far in 2024

Mariner Wealth Advisors secured an agreement for "a simultaneous transaction" acquiring AndCo Consulting and Fourth Street Performance Partners, which together have 100 employees and $104 billion in assets under advisement on behalf of institutional clients, Mariner said Feb. 1. 

Mariner and other RIA acquirers are taking a page out of the wirehouse playbook by acquiring firms that enable them to offer the full breadth of financial services, according to John Langston, the CEO of RIA investment bank Republic Capital Group.

"The expansion of services, I believe, is the most important trend in wealth management. … I hope it's dawning on people that is where we are going as an industry," Langston recently told Financial Planning Chief Correspondent Tobias Salinger. "We are working diligently to find ways to meet the same needs that clients have always had, but to do it as an advisor rather than as a purveyor of products."

Read more: Mariner adds $104B in assets in 2-firm deal 

Phoenix-based Osaic, the private equity-backed firm formerly known as Advisor Group, secured an agreement to purchase Radnor, Pennsylvania-based Lincoln Financial's wealth arms — Lincoln Financial Advisors and Lincoln Financial Securities — at a price of $700 million in "capital benefit" upon the expected close in the first half of 2024.

"Lincoln entered into an agreement with Osaic because the transaction enables Lincoln to continue to focus on growing our individual insurance solutions and workplace solutions businesses and leveraging our core strengths, including our distribution leadership and strong brand, to deliver future value for all of our stakeholders," said Lincoln spokeswoman Sarah Boxler in an email to Financial Planning.

Read more: Inside Osaic's plans for Lincoln's wealth business after the $700M deal 

Four former Avantax executives earned a combined total of $35.1 million in cash and equity — so-called "golden parachutes" — after Cetera Holdings acquired Avantax. The severance plan in their contracts emphasizes how mergers and acquisitions can impact compensation for the sellers.

Immediate payouts are "critical in private transactions but not the sole consideration," Brandon Kawal, principal of management consulting and transaction advisory firm Advisor Growth Strategies, said in an email to Financial Planning.

"We coach our clients to focus on linking who benefits from consideration at different times," Kawal said. "For example, founders might do well with short-term consideration based on their timelines, but the next-gen team might be more interested in long-term upside. This dynamic will define M&A moving forward. For this specific transaction, I think you see this at play. The shareholders are doing well through a share-price premium, and an executive team has an outcome. The long-term upside for clients and advisors is the combined scale of the organization."

Read more: $35M Avantax golden parachutes highlight role of compensation in M&A