Rumors of an impending AssetMark sale, first raised in December, have proven true.
AssetMark Financial Holdings Inc. announced Thursday it agreed to be acquired by private equity firm GTCR.
Stockholders of the turnkey asset management platform and technology provider will receive $35.25 per share in cash based on an equity valuation of $2.7 billion, according to a statement prepared by AssetMark. This grants GTCR full ownership of AssetMark, which the firm’s board of directors unanimously approved.
Chicago-based GTCR invests in more than 280 companies across many industries and sectors. It is also not the firm’s first foray into wealth management—it took a 25% stake in Captrust Financial Advisors in 2020. Captrust has since expanded assets by about 83%—from $390 billion in June 2020 to more than $714 billion by August 2023.
In a February interview with WealthManagement.com, AssetMark CEO Michael Kim, who joined the firm in 2010, said he saw the opportunity.
“The hybrid was where the puck was headed,” he said. “The independent hybrid model, this incredible secular trend, was just starting to unfold.”
When he joined the firm, AssetMark was a leader in serving independent broker/dealer advisors.
“Back then, the makeup was about 98% IBD-hybrid and 2% RIA advisors; now that has shifted to 70% IBD-hybrid and 30% RIA advisors [working with AssetMark],” he said.
AssetMark, which has approximately $117 billion of assets on the platform, reported a 14.5% year-over-year increase in its platform assets, which stood at $109.7 billion at the end of January 2024.
Its platform serves over 9,300 financial advisors and over 257,000 investor households (up 5.6% year-over-year as of January), according to AssetMark.
The AssetMark platform supports custom portfolio creation, management, advanced analytics, performance reporting, and asset custody services.
In recent years, the firm has added financial planning (Voyant acquisition), prospecting and marketing, among other technologies, to build an end-to-end platform solution for advisory firms.
Kim said the firm had $60 million in its 2024 capital budget dedicated to technology, up from $45 million spent on technology the year before.
According to securities filings, Chinese securities firm Huatai Securities purchased a majority stake in the firm for $768 million in 2016, ultimately owning almost 70% of the company.
Based in California, AssetMark has over 1,000 employees and was founded in 1996.