Larry Roth steps down from RCAP board after four months

Four months after joining the board of directors of RCS Capital, the Cetera CEO is stepping down. The company insisted his resignation was not related to a disagreement.

Four months after joining the board of directors for RCS Capital Corp., Larry Roth, chief executive officer of Cetera Financial Group, is resigning from the board, according to an announcement from the company late Monday.

The company said in the statement that Mr. Roth, who joined the board May 1, was going to focus his efforts on his role as CEO of Cetera, the firm’s retail advice unit, which has around 9,500 advisers.

“Mr. Roth’s resignation did not result from a disagreement with the company or the board of directors,” the company said in an SEC filing.

As part of the changes, Peter M. Budko, who was once chief investment officer at RCAP, also resigned from the board. Bryan L. Nygaard, who had been chief operating officer, resigned from that role but will remain chief financial officer at Cetera, according to the SEC filing.

The move is the latest reorganization for the company, which earlier this month said it was selling its wholesaling business to Apollo Global Management for $25 million. As part of that, RCAP said it was replacing its CEO, Michael Weil, and chief financial officer, Brian Jones. Two senior Apollo executives also joined RCAP’s board at the time, which has seven directors following the resignations of Messrs. Roth and Budko.

William R. Katz, an analyst with Citigroup Global Markets Inc., said Mr. Roth’s resignation from the board was “surprising,” given that he was only recently appointed, and added that it likely lessens the probability of Mr. Roth replacing Mr. Weil as CEO, “a change we would have viewed favorably given [Mr. Roth’s] experience, prior execution track record and knowledge of the firm.”

A spokesman for RCAP, Andrew Backman, did not respond to a request for additional comment.
Mr. Budko will continue to serve on the board at AR Global, a newly formed company that is majority owned by Apollo and includes RCS Capital’s wholesale distribution business and the asset management business AR Capital, a private real estate investment company launched by Nicholas Schorsch in 2007.