Kingswood raises $115 million of SPAC cash and its Wall Street profile by cutting in Larry Roth; but can they buy RIAs at the right price in a feverish market?

With the RIA rollup game go-big-or-go-home, making a royal alliance between British founders and Roth boosted the blank-check venture

Author Oisin Breen December 19, 2020 at 2:02 AM

2 Comments

Larry Roth: Our first acquisition will be a very large, well-established, branded firm.

Mark Casady

Larry Roth

Kingswood Holdings Ltd

Brian Murphy

December 19, 2020 — 4:39 AM

You know we're nearing another peak when the big stories of the day are about financing vehicles. Barbarians at the Gate comes to mind (along with a slew of other LBO shops of the 1980s). Lou Ranieri and mortgage backed securities of the early 1990s. Now it's SPACs. When investors are so silly as to fund "strategies" that are nothing more than "give us money and we'll buy other highly profitable firms...and keep 20% for ourselves", it's best to watch from the sidelines. All of these investment industry SPACs are nothing more than money grabs by senior executives who recognize the opportunity for what it is...cheap money with no strings attached for a couple of years. Heads I win, tails you lose. The 1% pushing to move up to the 0.5%. Are there ANY benefits to the average American in any of these transactions? No. Do you think either of these SPACs intend to drive down the cost of investment management in the industry? Of course not. The goal is to consolidate and keep prices high. Same as it ever was.

George Papadopoulos

December 19, 2020 — 9:32 AM

What Brian said :)

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FSC Securities Corporation
RIA-Friendly Broker-Dealer
Top Executive: Jerry Murphy