Dakota Wealth Management, Peter Raimondi’s registered investment advisory firm in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., has acquired Springside Partners, a female-founded and operated wealth management firm in Akron, Ohio. The acquisition is Dakota’s fourth since its formation a year ago, bringing the firm’s total assets under management to more than $1 billion.
Springside Partners Founder and CEO Carina Diamond split from sister company SS&G Wealth Management last summer, and shifted her business entirely to fee-only, leaving Cetera Advisors.
Diamond will join Dakota as the firm’s Chief Client Experience Officer, and she will serve on the firm’s Executive Committee. Springside advisors will continue to serve their clients out of their current location in Akron.
She’s well-known for encouraging female involvement in the industry. Diamond co-founded Springside Partners in 2014, offering financial and investment planning for clients. Diamond said she was excited about the chance to introduce Dakota clients to "flourish: women & wealth," a program she founded to offer participants education on wealth advisory issues. Thousands of women had enrolled in the program since its inception in 2009, Diamond said.
"We haven't been for sale; we just found that after meeting with (Dakota's) team, we realized we can be even better together and blow up this space," she told WealthManagement.com.
Raimondi formed Dakota in 2018 with teams from Oakmont Partners, a Massachusetts-based RIA with more than $300 million in assets, and Florida-based Strategic Asset Management Group, which managed $150 million in client assets. In January, the firm announced the acquisition of Boston-based GML Associates.
Raimondi's work at Dakota is the latest development in a long history of forming and expanding RIA firms. After founding The Colony Group in 1986, Raimondi grew the firm to $1 billion in assets for the next two decades. He then founded Banyan Partners, acquiring seven firms in five years and growing the firm to $4.3 billion in assets before selling it to Boston Private in 2014.
Diamond stressed the partnership was also a natural fit because of the emphasis both firms placed on introducing and developing next-generation talent in the industry.
"Together, we can bring a lot of additional young people into the space," she said. "But we're also setting a national example."