Hightower has taken a stake within the Denver-based Dechtman Wealth Administration, a monetary planning agency with $800 million in consumer belongings. It’s Hightower’s sixth strategic funding of the 12 months.
Dechtman Wealth is a workforce of eight led by three companions/wealth managers, together with founder Jordan Dechtman and his sons Sam and Adam Dechtman. The agency focuses on monetary steerage, retirement earnings, tax and property planning.
The phrases of the deal between Hightower and Dechtman (together with the dimensions of the stake) weren’t disclosed. In keeping with Jordan Dechtman, becoming a member of Hightower will assist the agency entry a “host of extra instruments and companies” to assist its purchasers.
“We function on 4 fundamental rules—all the time do what’s finest for the consumer, present a straight-forward price, have clear communication and deal with purchasers with care and respect,” he mentioned.
Chicago-based Hightower works with companies in 35 states and Washington, D.C. Personal fairness agency Thomas E. Lee Companions owns Hightower; in Could, WealthManagement.com reported that the PE agency took it off the market as a result of it didn’t get the value it needed from potential patrons.
Advisor teams partnering with the agency get instruments for enhancing natural progress, together with consulting, advertising assist, tech and funding administration assets, and back-office wants like compliance, accounting and payroll. The companies additionally get help with inorganic progress methods, together with deal structuring, due diligence and capital for M&A.
In October, Hightower acquired a majority stake in NEPC, an institutional consulting agency and outsourced chief funding officer that introduced institutional analysis and funding capabilities in-house for Hightower advisors.
Hightower anticipated to maintain NEPC’s govt workforce and funding course of intact, with NEPC Managing Accomplice Mike Manning becoming a member of Hightower’s board of administrators. Hightower mentioned the deal would assist non-public wealth buyers focused on “allocations to personal market investments.”
Moreover, up to now a number of months, Hightower has made strategic investments in Charles D. Hyman & Firm, a registered funding advisor in Ponte Verda Seaside, Fla., with $2.3 billion in consumer belongings, and Monetary Planning and Data Companies, a $1.1 billion RIA primarily based in De Pere, Wis.
In current months, Hightower’s additionally been waging a authorized battle with Lars Knudsen, a former advisor who claimed the agency “hijacks” the books of enterprise of advisors like himself earlier than pushing these workers out, as Knudsen claims occurred to him.
Hightower introduced (and subsequently dropped) litigation towards Knudsen, claiming he broke his non-solicitation vows after he was fired. Knudsen claimed the agency did so days earlier than a federal decide was prone to rule towards them.
Nonetheless, final month, Hightower sued the Wash.-based RIA the place Knudsen went to work, arguing the agency conspired with Knudsen to steal confidential Hightower info, which has price the agency $150 million in consumer belongings.
