Strategic acquirers helped the market hit a record for ‘mega-deals,’ or acquisitions of firms with over $20 billion in client assets, in the third quarter of a record-setting year for dealmaking, according to a new report by investment banking boutique Echelon Partners.
Echelon, which uses a combination of public and proprietary data, counted 13 such deals in the third quarter, the most since the firm started tracking mega-deals in 2020. That beat the 11 such deals in the first half of 2025 and the last quarter record of nine set in the fourth quarter of 2021.
The deals ranged between strategic buyers, who are adding major scale to their firms, and financial buyers such as private equity firms, family offices, and holding companies, which are backing scaled enterprises with capital.
“In the wealth management industry, strategic acquirers have historically accounted for most transactions, though the most active strategic acquirers typically have at least one financial partner to contribute incremental capital for growth,” Echelon’s team wrote in the report.
Creative Planning already oversees $390 billion in client assets across wealth and retirement, and this week announced it is working to
close a deal for SageView Advisory Group, a $250 billion RIA heavy on institutional assets. Private equity firm Aquiline Capital Partners is the firm’s majority shareholder that will exit once the deal closes.
Corient, the registered investment advisor arm of Mubadala Capital-owned CI Financial, acquired two U.K.-based wealth managers overseeing a
combined $214 billion in assets.
Finally, Cleveland-based MAI Capital Management acquired Los Angeles-based RIA Evoke Advisors, which will nearly double the firm’s size to approximately $60 billion.
Barnaby Audsley, senior vice president at Echelon, said even with the recent strategic “mega-merger” deals, those transactions appear circumstantial and not necessarily an ongoing trend.
“We do expect more mega-mergers as the market matures but continue to believe that most strategic acquirers are focused on smaller tuck-in acquisitions that are easier to integrate and drive synergy value,” Audsley said.
He added that strategic acquirers like Creative Planning and LPL Financial, which acquired Commonwealth Financial Network earlier this year, have the scale and motivation over private equity regarding major acquisitions.
“Private equity firms cannot compete with Mallouk and co. on deals like this,” Audsley said. “He won a similar process when acquiring United Capital from Goldman, where PE also lost out.”
Financial backers in the RIA space also did some significant deals.
Notably, private equity firm Madison Dearborn Partners took back control of Aon’s wealth business, which it sold a little over a year ago. For the price tag of about $2.7 billion, it is now in control of a group of wealth shops led by Wealthspire Advisors CEO Mike LaMena.
In addition, Stone Point Capital and CPP Investments bought a majority stake in hybrid RIA OneDigital, which valued the firm at more than $7 billion. Private equity firm Onex remains a significant minority shareholder in OneDigital, which oversees about $143 billion in assets under management and advisement.
Like several other industry deal watchers, Echelon reported record transaction volume in wealth. The firm tracked 125 transactions in the third quarter, higher than a prior record set in the fourth quarter of 2024.
For the full year, Echelon said activity was 44% higher than a year ago, at 345 transactions.
According to Echelon, direct private equity investments, which have been a major driver of acquisitions, actually declined slightly quarter-to-quarter to 11 direct transactions from 12.
For the full year, private equity firm investments match the deal flow records, with Echelon reporting 231 transactions year-to-date, compared to the prior record of 215 for the same period last year.
Private equity is certainly involved in most of the serial RIA acquirers in the market, with the five most active firms either majority-owned or minority-owned by private equity backers.
Echelon tracked the following firms: Carson Group (14 deals), Merit Financial (14), Mariner Wealth Advisors (10), Mercer Advisors (10) and Wealth Enhancement (10).
Echelon’s conservative estimate of deal count for the year is 440, surpassing 2024’s total by 100 and being the most on record for a year by far.
Deal size, however, is slightly below the four-year average of $1.7 billion.
That trend shows that “buyers are pursuing a broader mix of acquisitions to sustain inorganic growth,” Echelon wrote. “This shift indicates a slight normalization in deal sizes … as acquirers focus on integrating past acquisitions and identifying scalable, mid-sized firms that align with their growth strategies.”
The bankers at Echelon see a continued role for sovereign wealth investors in the space, similar to Fisher Investments selling a stake to the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority.
“The trend of sovereign funds investing in the North American wealth and asset management industry has momentum,” Audsley said. “They are a pool of capital that can be extremely patient, which aligns well with wealth managers’ desire for long-term partnerships. “
