Office address: 200 W Madison, 25th Floor, Chicago, IL 60606
Website: hightoweradvisors.com
Year established: 2008
Company type: financial services
Employees: 1,700+ (2023)
Expertise: wealth management, investment planning, financial planning, retirement planning, 401(k) consulting, cash management, equity strategies, fixed income strategies, multi-asset portfolios, private market solutions
Parent company: N/A
Key people: Larry Restieri (CEO), Dan Berg (CFO), Stephanie Link (chief investment strategist), Jenn Anderson (CMO), Scott Hadley (chief advisory officer), Robert Lavigne (chief compliance officer), Jennifer Krevitt (CHRO)
Financing status: private equity-backed
Hightower Advisors is a registered investment advisor based in Chicago that focuses on wealth management. The firm serves individuals, foundations, and family offices with investment and retirement planning services. It oversees $350 billion in assets with 663 advisors in 33 states as of September 2025.
Hightower Advisors was founded in 2008 by Elliott Weissbluth, a former wirehouse executive with a vision. Weissbluth built the firm for advisors who wanted independence without the burden of running operations.
The company launched just before the 2009 financial crisis but managed to thrive during the disruption. Distrust in big brokerage firms helped fuel its early growth in wealth management.
The company shifted its business model over the years from an employee-based partnership to an acquirer. Weissbluth stepped down as CEO and Bob Oros took over in January 2019. Oros led Hightower through a period of growth and acquisitions over the next several years.
In 2024, Hightower made a strategic investment in Capital Management Group, a New York-based wealth management firm. The deal marked the company's first announced acquisition of the year after closing 12 deals in 2023.
The company entered a new phase in 2025 when Larry Restieri, a former Goldman Sachs executive, became CEO. Restieri replaced Oros, who stepped down after leading the firm since 2019.
It then launched Hightower Signature Wealth as a national direct-to-consumer advisory practice. Dallas-based Frontier Investment Management became the first firm to rebrand under this new platform.
Hightower Advisors combines institutional asset management capabilities with boutique-level service and accessibility:
The company also offers advisors the choice to maintain their own brand or join Hightower Signature Wealth. It provides operational support, lead generation, and investment capabilities powered by Chief Investment Strategist Stephanie Link.
Hightower states that it looks for professionals with strong ethics and long-term focus. The culture prioritizes professional development, hard work, and client care. Its principles include:
The company also describes its workplace as fast-paced and future-focused. It offers collaborative work days with catered meals and other perks:
The firm extends opportunities to students through internships in operations, planning, and client services. Interns receive hands-on training within Hightower's fiduciary culture.
Larry Restieri serves as CEO and board member at Hightower since joining in June 2025. Restieri previously spent 25 years at Goldman Sachs, where he led the AYCO wealth planning business. He holds a bachelor's degree from Harvard and a Juris Doctor from Fordham University School of Law.
Hightower's executive leadership team supports Restieri in guiding the firm's direction:
This leadership team sets the strategic direction for Hightower. They work together to help advisors strengthen client relationships and grow their practices.
The company partnered with Pontera, a retirement-focused fintech, in January 2025 to help advisors manage client 401(k) accounts. The integration allows advisors to provide more complete service across tax, investment, and estate planning. This strategy supports its mission of delivering customized retirement solutions to its clients.
Beyond retirement tools, Hightower Advisors is also expanding its advisor network through Signature Wealth. The firm added five advisory practices to the brand, bringing total assets to over $20 billion across 19 locations. The brand gives the company a way to bring in smaller practices and scale its operations.
Independent RIAs have become the fastest-growing advisor channel as consolidators, equity incentives, and tax-efficient deal structures reshape recruiting – and expose growing tensions around career paths, ownership, and scale.
Journey Strategic Wealth, a $5 billion RIA, becomes the first external acquisition for Hightower Signature Wealth, advancing the W-2 model that CEO Larry Restieri calls “largely the future of Hightower.”
With a goal of hitting $250 billion in assets by 2035, the wealth platform is betting on leadership steeped in advisor transitions and full-service wealth management.
Abby Salameh will lead Mercer's New Jersey and greater Philadelphia markets, while Chris Walters will oversee the San Diego market.
Meanwhile, Composition Wealth adds a Hightower leader to its C-suite, and a veteran executive from Osaic comes to bolster Lenox Advisors' planning capabilities.
The deal adds Verus’s $1.2 trillion institutional advisory footprint into Cerity, an RIA that manages roughly $150 billion in existing assets including $8.5 billion tied to its family office division.
Osaic has also gained ground in St. Louis with a veteran pair from Stifel, while the Hightower-aligned Bahnsen Group gets a foothold in Silicon Valley.
A record 322 M&A transactions in 2025 shattered the previous deal flow pace in the RIA market, but DeVoe & Company’s report shows the surge further concentrated power among a handful of dominant firms.
Bob Lavigne’s arrival as CCO formalizes a dual-compliance structure following the launch of Hightower Signature Wealth to consolidate RIAs under a single brand.
Veteran compliance executive joins as firm expands, modernizes regulatory and risk governance platform.
Mercer and Wealth Enhancement will receive client referrals from Goldman Sachs Ayco, which was previously led by Hightower Advisors CEO Larry Restieri.
The conversions add more than $20 billion in assets collectively to the mega-RIAs recently launched brand aimed squarely at enticing smaller partners.
Focus Financial says its latest CEO change was part of a succession plan, but the $520 billion RIA's transition gives the market only about seven weeks of public notice.
New data shows surging advisor appetite for semi-liquid alts despite education and trust challenges.
After a multi-state court fight and allegations he was "phased out of work" for younger advisors, Glenn Frank and Hightower told an Illinois federal judge they’ve reached the framework of a settlement.
