Mariner boosts focus on breakaways by acquiring Financial Services Network

Mariner Wealth Advisors is making a major expansion into the breakaway broker market by acquiring The Financial Services Network, a back-office platform currently serving 420 advisers who have $26 billion worth of assets under management and advisement.

The deal, which is expected to be completed in September, amounts to an acquisition by Mariner Platform Solutions, a 2-year-old platform that's a tenth the size of the company it’s buying.

“We launched Mariner Platform Solutions in 2020 to free independent advisers from back-office responsibilities and return them to what they do best: providing world-class financial guidance to their clients,” said Marty Bicknell, president and chief executive of Mariner Wealth Advisors.

“Today is a win for advisers who seek to spend more time advising their clients and growing their business and less time managing the day-to-day operations,” Bicknell said.

An aggressive RIA aggregator, Mariner has grown to $62 billion under management with 550 registered investment advisers.

But Mariner Platform Solutions, with 40 independent advisers and $2.6 billion, is seen as a fresh channel of opportunity, Bicknell said.

The Network, which was founded in 1984, has evolved over the years as an RIA firm and provider of support services for independent financial advisers. The Network is led by Daxs Stadjuhar, Christopher Mercado and Jeremy Olen, and currently has more than 400 advisers in 20 states.

The Network’s RIA, which includes a portfolio consulting business, has $6 billion under management, with the remaining $20 billion under advisement through independent advisers.

The new platform, which comes with 55 employees who are mostly based in Sacramento, California, will be rebranded Mariner Advisor Network and will be an offering as part of Mariner Platform Solutions.

The platform will also continue its strategic relationship with LPL Financial, giving its advisers further access to the resources of one of the nation’s leading RIA custodians and its largest independent broker-dealer.

“The depth of experience among the professionals at The Network and the reach and expertise of LPL Financial will enable us to serve more advisers and enhance their access to some of the industry’s best back-office and consulting resources,” Bicknell said.

“It’s exciting when you get the chance to align your organization with a firm that shares the same vision and principles for taking care of advisers so they can take better care of their clients," LPL managing director Matthew Enyedi said in a statement. "Through our partnership with The Network and our new relationship with Mariner Wealth Advisors, we are helping advisers choose the business model, services, and technology that empower them to run a highly efficient and scalable practice.”

Daniel Seivert, chief executive of Echelon Partners, said the deal puts Mariner in a good position to attract more independent advisers leaving the brokerage channel.

“The Network will provide a powerful platform for Mariner to offer a unique and important subset of the adviser community — those advisers that would like to remain 1099 or independent — to achieve attractive tax advantages and who prefer to utilize vendor partners over building the larger pieces of their business model,” he said. “Expect more deals like this in the coming years as other buyers look to gain platforms that allow them to serve this community.”

Chuck Failla, who founded Sovereign Financial Group almost four years ago to provide services like The Network, described Mariner’s acquisition as a “breakaway play that gives advisers the option to hold onto their legacy business.”

Failla said such platforms are especially appealing to the so-called hybrid adviser that maintains both fee-based and commission-based accounts or is breaking away from the brokerage channel and is transitioning to fee-based planning.

“It seems like they’re saying for those advisers that don’t want to become part of mother Mariner, they will provide the back-office platform,” he added.

With $600 million under management and about a dozen advisers on the Sovereign platform, Failla said he is competing in the same space as Mariner for breakaway advisers, “but I can promise you Marty is in no way concerned about us.”