RIA M&A Deal Tracker 2026

The Trading Market Signals RIA M&A Deal Tracker follows the pace, size, and ownership of registered investment adviser mergers and acquisitions through 2026, a year that has now produced the busiest first half the industry has ever recorded. As of August 24, 2026, Echelon Partners counts 262 announced transactions in the first six months, ahead of 220 in the same period of 2025, with private equity behind roughly three-quarters of the activity. The two quarters tell different stories about size. Q1 moved about $1.67 trillion across 142 deals; Q2 moved $378 billion across 120. By our calculation the average transacted AUM per deal fell from roughly $11.8 billion to $3.2 billion, a 73% drop, while the count stayed near record. August has restarted the size curve: Corient agreed on August 5 to acquire the $21 billion ultra-high-net-worth RIA Summit Trail Advisors, and the roughly $7 billion auction of Wealth Enhancement Group between Carlyle and Bain Capital remains unresolved. A second layer is now visible beneath the deal count. One sponsor can sit behind several bidders at once: Carlyle backs MAI Capital and Prime Capital Financial, holds a minority position in Captrust, and is one of the two finalists for Wealth Enhancement.

Market gauge (2026)

Recent deal tape (2026)

What is new in August 2026?

Two things changed since the last update. Echelon closed the books on the second quarter at 120 transactions and $378 billion, the most active Q2 it has recorded, which puts the first half at 262 deals against 220 a year earlier. Divide the reported totals by the reported counts and the average transacted AUM per deal fell from about $11.8 billion in Q1 to about $3.2 billion in Q2. That 73% drop is the number to watch. It says the record count is structural, driven by founder succession and a deep field of buyers, while the $1.67 trillion Q1 headline was the arithmetic of a few very large platforms moving at once.

August then restarted the size curve. Corient agreed on August 5 to acquire Summit Trail Advisors, a $21 billion New York firm serving ultra-high-net-worth families as an outsourced family office and CIO, which is the largest disclosed US RIA acquisition announced so far this year and takes Corient toward $556 billion in assets. Three smaller deals landed in the same window: Allworth added the $1.1 billion tax-focused Sachetta, Aspen Standard reached its ninth deal with $550 million Denver Private Wealth Management, and Wealth Enhancement bought $592 million Miramar Capital in Northbrook while its own owners run an auction of the firm. That auction, between Carlyle and Bain Capital at roughly $7 billion including debt, is still unresolved as of August 24.

The tape now includes one transaction that is not an RIA purchase at all. Mesirow agreed on August 13 to buy the plan-level 3(38) business of flexPATH Strategies, its second outsourced-fiduciary deal in 101 days. We include it because the discretion over 401(k) investment menus is consolidating on the same logic as advisory books, and because plan sponsors carry a documentation obligation when that discretion changes hands. Our analysis of what committees have to re-approve is in Mesirow added $49 billion of outsourced 401(k) discretion in 101 days.

Who is behind the buyers?

The week of August 18 produced five announced transactions and one pattern worth isolating. MAI Capital closed OG Private Wealth on August 14 and Wealth Enhancement closed Servo Wealth Management on August 15. MAI has been majority-owned by Carlyle since June 4. Wealth Enhancement is being auctioned, and Carlyle is one of the two remaining bidders. Two sellers, one week, and potentially one ultimate owner.

We now track sponsor concentration as its own metric because it is invisible in a normal deal count. Carlyle holds four RIA positions built with four different instruments: a minority growth stake in Captrust from 2023, majority control of MAI since June 2026, roughly $600 million of hybrid capital plus a minority interest in Prime Capital Financial signed in August, and a live bid for Wealth Enhancement. Dividing each deal value by the client assets involved gives a narrow band, 3.6 cents per dollar at MAI and at Prime Capital and 4.4 cents at Wealth Enhancement, which suggests the choice between equity and credit was a financing decision rather than a valuation one. Captrust sits at 1.7 cents because its book is weighted toward institutional retirement advisory, where revenue per dollar of assets is far lower.

For a seller running a competitive process, the practical consequence is that two logos in the room may draw on the same limited partners. Form ADV Part 1, Schedules A and B, names direct and indirect owners at 25% and above, which is where that overlap becomes checkable before signing. Our full analysis, including the diligence checklist and the questions to put to a buyer in writing, is in Carlyle now backs three RIA platforms and is bidding for a fourth.

What does the tracker measure?

This page follows the deal-making that is consolidating the registered investment adviser industry: the quarterly count of announced transactions, the assets that change hands, the share of deals backed or sponsored by private equity, the average size of sellers, and a running tape of named transactions. Where research firms report the same period on different methodologies, we show each rather than pick one. Each figure carries a named source and an explicit “as of” date, and we update the tables as new quarterly reports and deal announcements land. Figures we derive ourselves, such as the average transacted AUM per deal, are labeled as TMS calculations with the inputs shown so any reader can reproduce them.

Why is RIA M&A still accelerating?

After several years of predictions that rising rates or a saturated field of buyers would slow consolidation, the pace keeps climbing. Private equity supplies the capital, retiring founders supply the sellers, and buyers keep moving upmarket in the deals that make headlines. The newer pattern is the kind of buyer: serial acquirers grow on two fronts at once, absorbing whole RIAs and recruiting wirehouse breakaway teams, while bolting on adjacent tax and accounting practices to own more of the client relationship. The Wealth Enhancement auction adds a third pattern at the top of the market, where the platforms themselves are now the asset being traded between sponsors. What the Q2 average tells us is that beneath those headlines the ordinary deal is getting smaller, not larger. A quality seller has more credible bidders than ever, and a poor cultural fit has fewer than the headline count suggests.

What it means for advisors and sellers

The buyer across the table has changed, and the leverage has shifted with it. Our full analysis of the early-June deal wave, the two-front consolidation model, and three questions for a selling principal is in Serial RIA acquirers open June buying firms and breakaway teams at once. For the move upmarket in seller size, see RIA M&A concentration and the seller’s market, and for the record first quarter that set the pace, see Echelon’s record 142-deal quarter. For the shift from buying AUM to selling growth services, see why consolidators are selling growth, not just buying firms. For the buyer’s time horizon, and why permanent-capital holdcos are selling against the private equity exit clock, see the RIA buyer that promises never to sell you.

Last updated August 24, 2026. This tracker is provided for information only and is not investment advice. Figures are compiled from public reporting and company announcements and are accurate as of the dates shown; reliance on any information is at the reader’s sole risk.