The fourth quarter of 2020 saw a record 69 mergers and acquisitions of registered investment advisory firms, according to Echelon Partners.
The record RIA dealmaking in the fourth quarter resulted in transactions posting an all-time high in 2020 for the eighth consecutive year — 205 deals occurred through Dec. 22, up from 203 in 2019.
“This is an impressive rebound, given the 162 total deals forecasted for 2020 at the end of the second quarter, which was the slowest period for RIA M&A in roughly four years,” said Mark Bruno, a managing director at the firm.
The firm’s RIA M&A Deal Report for the fourth quarter also found that average assets under management per deal increased 23.7% in 2020 from 2019.
The size of firms that were acquired in 2020 also hit a record high of $1.8 billion.
[More: The hunt for mega RIAs]
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