PE driving wealth M&A

Private equity has become the growth driver for the Australian wealth management sector with PE entities proving pivotal in more than 60% of the sector’s most recent significant transactions.

This week’s news that WT Financial Group has entered into a joint venture arrangement with PE player Merchant Wealth Partners coincided with confirmation that locally based PE firm, Adamentam Capital, had completed its acquisition of Mason Stevens.

That, in turn, comes against the background of the competing private equity bids for Insignia Financial and the news that Oaktree Capital Management has taken a significant stake in Paul Barratt’s AZ Next Generation Advisory.

Then, too, Australian-based Pemba financed the acquisition of self-managed superannuation funds (SMSFs) business, Super Concepts, from AMP Limited, while big PE Player, KKR acquired the Commonwealth Bank’s 55% stake in Colonial First State (CFS) in 2021 and has largely underwritten the firm’s ride back into the competitive platforms market.

KKR has also been front and centre in seeking to acquire Perpetual’s corporate trust and wealth management business in a deal which has stalled but may yet regather momentum.

The reason for the PE interest in Australian wealth assets is simple with the latest UBS Global Wealth Report explaining that Australia has the fifth largest average wealth globally, placing it ahead of both the United Kingdom and Singapore.

And, in terms of simple market pragmatics, most of Australia’s publicly-listed wealth management companies have, until to recently, been regarded as comparatively under-valued.

Significantly, the competing bids for Insignia Financial from Bain Capital and CC Capital has seen the company’s share price move from $3.51 at the start of January to peak at $4.67 in early March with both Bain and CC having independently submitted bids at a price of $5 cash per share.

Both Bain and CC Capital remain in due diligence that is expected to be completed later this month.

The bottom line, however, is that private equity has been the dominant factor in the wealth management mergers and acquisitions space and is likely to remain so.