Advent International acquires up to $3bn minority stake in Fisher Investments

Private Equity Wire

US private equity firm Advent International and a subsidiary of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority will acquire a $2.5bn to $3bn minority stake in money management firm Fisher Investments, valuing FI at $12.75bn. 

Following completion of the deal, which marks the first external investment in FI, David Mussafer, Managing Partner at Advent, will join FI’s board of directors. FI’s founder, executive chairman and co-CIO Ken Fisher, CEO Damian Ornani and the remaining management will continue in their current roles.

As part of the deal, Mr Fisher will sell personal holdings in FI to Advent-managed funds — whose investors include Lunate Capital managed funds, Mousse Partners and FI’s largest institutional client, South Korea’s National Pension Service — and ADIA. Mr Fisher will retain a majority of beneficial ownership and of voting shares exceeding 70%. 

As an investment adviser, wealth and asset management firm, FI manages over $275bn for over 150,000 clients globally, according to a press statement. 

Mr Fisher said in a press statement that the transaction was “aimed dually at estate tax and planning purposes while assuring that FI will maintain its traditional culture, growth evolution and devotion to exceptional client service”, emphasising its “atypically long holding period for a private equity transaction”. 

JP Morgan Securities, RBC Capital Markets and Paul Hastings advised FI. Ropes & Gray advised Advent and Gibson Dunn advised ADIA. 

The full article is available here. This article was published at Private Equity Wire.