F.L.Putnam adds $1 billion Wisconsin team in record 12th deal

F.L.Putnam Investment Management Company has pushed into Wisconsin for the first time, agreeing to acquire the Red Granite team from an affiliate of 1251 Capital Group in a deal that adds roughly $1 billion in client assets and a proprietary large-cap growth strategy to the Lynnfield, Massachusetts-based registered investment advisor.

The transaction, announced Wednesday, is the largest F.L.Putnam has completed to date and the 12th deal struck under chief executive Tom Manning.

It is also the firm's third acquisition of 2026, following a busy 12 months in which the RIA has expanded its New England base, brought in outside capital, and now moved into a second Midwest market.

Red Granite's Milwaukee office will stay in place under co-chief investment officers Joel D. Vrabel and David J. Drzadinski, who have run a large-cap growth equity strategy together since 1996. The pair oversee more than $1 billion for private clients as of August 31, using a bottom-up stock-picking approach aimed at beating the Russell 1000 Growth Index with less volatility than the broader benchmark.

"The addition of Joel, David, and their team establishes our first presence in Wisconsin and our second location in the Midwest, while adding a differentiated large-cap equity strategy to our investment platform," Manning said in a statement announcing the deal.

Vrabel framed the move as a chance to extend a three-decade track record onto a larger platform.

"Tom and his team have built a premier investment platform with tremendous depth and expertise that will allow us to build on what we have created over the past 30 years and deliver even more value to our clients," he said.

Drzadinski added that joining F.L.Putnam "gives us the opportunity to bring our large-cap equity strategy to a broader platform while continuing to focus on the work and client relationships that have driven our success for the past three decades."

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The Red Granite acquisition caps a year in which F.L.Putnam has moved on multiple fronts to scale up. In July, the firm took on a strategic minority investment from Bixby Wealth Solutions, an arm of Austin, Texas-based Moontower Group backed by Carlyle's Global Credit business, a deal designed to fund national growth without disturbing F.L.Putnam's employee ownership structure or its leadership under Manning.

That followed the June acquisition of Seascape Capital Management in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, which pushed F.L.Putnam's total assets under management past $11 billion.

Earlier in the spring, F.L.Putnam acquired Arcadia Investment Management, its first foray into the Midwest that established its Kalamazoo, Michigan office.

The pace fits a broader pattern across the advisory industry this year. Echelon Partners' most recent RIA M&A Deal Report is pointing toward another record-setting season for wealth management M&A, with dealmakers closing 120 transactions in the second quarter alone and full-year volume tracking toward roughly 500 deals, which would top the prior high of 466 set the previous year.

Read more: RIA M&A shatters records as first-half deal count nears 40% jump

Serial acquirers with private equity backing, F.L.Putnam among them, have driven much of that momentum as they compete for scale and specialized investment talent.