Torrance-based registered investment adviser EP Wealth Advisors, led by Chief Executive Ryan Parker, recently announced its acquisition of the Dallas-based Sloan Investment Management LLC, more than doubling its total assets under management in the region.
EP Wealth said the partnership adds approximately $700 million in assets under management in the Dallas area, bringing its total AUM to over $1 billion in the region and $25.2 billion nationwide. The financial and legal terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Sloan’s founder and managing partner Frank Sloan will remain at the helm of local operations as EP Wealth’s new regional director and partner. Support staff will also remain in place.
“Partnering with EP Wealth gives us access to significant additional resources to evolve the way we serve our clients, providing both a more robust client experience and growth opportunities,” Sloan said in a statement.
Southern California companies have recently had a strong interest in expanding operations into Texas or moving them over entirely, noted Chris Manderson, a transactional attorney specializing in mergers and acquisitions and private equity. But the EP Wealth deal isn’t likely related to that trend, Manderson added, as acquisitions like this are a pretty standard business move for RIAs.
“It’s become very common for private equity in the last few years, where they’ll back these rollups of various RIAs in order to increase their total assets under management,” said Manderson, who chairs the corporate department at the Beverly Hills-based Ervin, Cohen & Jessup LLP. “It’s all built around multiple arbitrage.”
Manderson said it’s no surprise roll-ups are popular with private equity players, as the market generally tends to reward scale with a higher valuation. If the company benefiting from the roll-up itself ends up being sold off, investors reap significant benefits from that scaling.
