Rockefeller Capital Management, a longtime family office that in 2018 plunged into the broader wealth management business, said Tuesday it had raised a fresh round of capital from three investors, including the owners of Chanel. This recapitalization now brings the valuation of the firm – according to the company - to $6.6 billion, up from $3.1 billion just two years ago.
As of the end of last month, the firm oversaw $187 billion in client assets across its three businesses: Rockefeller Global Family Office, Rockefeller Asset Management and Rockefeller Strategic Advisory.
Financial advice and wealth management norms have long-pegged valuations of registered investment advisors at 1% of a firm's assets; in the case of Rockefeller Capital Management, that back-of-the-envelope math is closer to a 2.8% valuation. The market assessment for larger, high end firms like Rockefeller is usually a higher-than-average value.
The terms of the recapitalization were not disclosed.
“This recapitalization represents a significant step forward, fully aligned with Rockefeller Capital Management’s long-term strategic objectives,” said Gregory Fleming, CEO of the firm, in a statement.
Since its inception, Rockefeller Capital Management has been a destination for so-called breakaway brokers, or those financial advisors leaving large financial institutions – think Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley and others – in search of a smaller firm culture as well as a significant signing bonus.
Fleming himself is a wirehouse veteran. He worked at Merrill Lynch, eventually becoming president, up until it was bought by Bank of America in the deepest days of the credit crisis, from 1993 to 2009.
A year later Fleming went to work for Morgan Stanley and was head of wealth and asset management before leaving in 2016.
According to a report on CNBC.com, the recapitalization was led by Mousse Partners, the investment firm with ties to Chanel’s owners; Progeny 3, a Kirkland, Washington-based firm built on a shipping fortune; and Abrams Capital, the hedge fund manager founded by David Abrams, a protege of The Baupost Group’s Seth Klarman.
In 2023, Rockefeller Capital Management said it had sold a 20.5% stake for $622 million to IGM Financial, a member of the Power Corp. of Canada.
The Rockefeller family still owns a minority stake in the firm, having rolled over some of their equity from their former family office into Rockefeller when it was formed in 2018 with $18 billion in assets, according to the report.
With this latest transaction, which is expected to close by the end of the year, hedge fund and founding backer Viking Global Investors will no longer be the firm’s majority shareholder, but will still own the largest stake, according to the report.
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