In a busy market for wealth sector M&A in the past few years, the Canada/US group has set the pace in buying a raft of US businesses such as RIAs.

(Corrects month to July from June.)

CI Financial, the Toronto-listed financial group that has bought a mass of US wealth management firms in recent years, yesterday reported that it had preliminary total assets of C$430.3 billion ($316 billion) as of July 31.

Within that figure, US wealth assets – C$199.2 billion – have shot up by 33.1 per cent on a year ago, CI said in a statement. Elsewhere, CI said that asset management assets at end-July were C$123.7 billion, Canadian wealth management assets C$83.9 billion, and Canadian custody assets at C$23.5 billion.

The group said it has started to report its Canadian custody assets, which are administered by CI Investment Services, to “reflect the growing significance of this business.” This follows the conversion of client assets at Aligned Capital Partners Inc the CIIS platform in July 2023. Custody assets were historically not included as part of reported assets for Canada wealth management or consolidated total assets.

CI’s acquisition of wealth management firms, such as RIAs, has been one of the most eye-catching developments of recent years, starting in 2020. In July, CI acquired Intercontinental Wealth Advisors, a registered investment advisor firm based in San Antonio, Texas. 

At the start of August, CI Private Wealth, the business formed from the US acquisitions, rebranded as Corient.

As reported in May this year, CI Financial closed its previously-announced sale of a 20 per cent minority investment in its US wealth management business. The stake was sold to institutions including a wholly owned subsidiary of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, Bain Capital, Flexpoint Ford, Ares Management funds, the State of Wisconsin, and others for about C$1.34 billion ($1.0 billion). The organization, as reported here, has also sold some stakes in wealth firms. For example, at the start of May it agreed to sell a minority stake in Congress Wealth Management to Audax Private Equity. The sale increased industry speculation about CI’s stated intention to spin out its RIA business through an IPO.

A desire for economies of scale to deal with rising regulatory costs and tech spending, and the willingness of firms to sell, have fueled the process. Questions remain about how much of this consolidation will bear fruit. Recent figures suggest that the M&A trend is slowing down, affected by rising interest rates and economic uncertainties.