While private equity-backed acquirers still dominate the RIA M&A landscape, their percentage in deal involvement slightly slipped in 2026’s third quarter, according to a new Echelon report.
In total, the consulting firm’s M&A Deal Report for Q3 showed that the 125 transactions in the third quarter tied 2024’s fourth quarter and last year’s third quarter for the second-highest period on record, behind the first three months of 2026. According to Echelon, deal volume suggests 2026 will surpass 500 transactions, a record that would overtake the 466 deals in 2025.
In the report, Echelon noted that some “industry sources” had “described a softer third quarter.” (Although Echelon didn’t name them, reports released earlier this month from DeVoe, Piper Sandler and Fintrx suggested a lighter third-quarter deal market).
Echelon stated the differences were “definitional rather than directional,” noting that its count covers U.S. transactions involving firms with at least $100 million in assets.
Additionally, Echelon includes deals others may not, including international acquisitions by U.S. buyers, internal aggregation transactions (including Hightower’s four affiliate conversions this quarter into its Signature Wealth channel) and acquisitions of tax, insurance, retirement and consulting businesses by wealth managers. (Echelon counted 11 such deals this quarter.)
“Under Wealth 3.0, these converging service lines are redrawing the competitive landscape for advisors,” the report claimed.
According to Echelon, private equity-backed acquirers accounted for 92 of 125 announced transactions (73.6%), down from 75.8% in the second quarter. Echelon found that the share of strategic deals announced by PE-backed buyers also dropped slightly from 82% to 80.7% (this includes PE sponsors as well as RIAs and broker/dealers backed by these firms).
In reviewing the quarter’s announced deals, Echelon also noted several transactions in which acquirers targeted firms focused on serving specific client niches.
Those deals include The Vistra Group’s investment in Curi Capital (which works with medical professionals), Corient’s acquisition of Music Row Wealth Management (country music artists), as well as Wealth Enhancement’s Weinland Financial purchase (Washington state employees) and Allworth’s acquisition of Arthur Stein Financial (federal employees).
Though the number of deals hit the second-highest quarter, Echelon found the average deal size dipped from the second quarter, mainly due to serial acquirers focusing on sub-$1 billion “tuck-ins.”
However, throughout 2026, 33.6% of deals have involved sellers with over $1 billion in assets under management, and the year is on pace to have the second-highest annual volume of such deals.
Of the 37 $1 billion+ deals, 26 were strategic acquirers, with PE sponsors announcing 10 and a single venture investor group deal. All but one of the strategic deals were acquisitions, while seven in 10 sponsor deals were minority investments (though many of the strategic acquirers were PE-backed).
According to DeVoe & Company’s report, the third quarter deal market dropped 17% from the previous quarter, which the investment bank attributed to market volatility squeezing dealmaking among smaller firms that deal directly with clients. Piper Sandler reported a slightly higher tally for the quarter but still noted a slight dip from the same period the prior year.
However, they didn’t see the cooldown as indicative of a slower deal market, with Cameron Hoerner, a managing director in Piper Sandler’s financial services group, saying there “remains a wide universe of acquisitive platforms looking to grow inorganically, while sellers continue to come to market looking for the broader resources that these larger platforms can bring.”
DeVoe concurred, saying consolidators and large RIAs will likely keep deal totals high; to hit a record year in deal volume, DeVoe said there’d need to be 79 deals in the fourth quarter, slightly lower than the 81 deals counted in each of the fourth quarters of 2024 and 2025.
“The third-quarter slowdown has put a record year in doubt, but it has not taken one off the table,” the DeVoe team wrote.