MAI Capital faucets Barron’s rankings veteran for advisor recruiting push
Matt Barthel, managing accomplice, Strategic Advisor Recruiting at MAI Capital Management.
Carlyle-backed RIA hires Matt Barthel to focus on advisor lift-outs as wirehouse attrition climbs and impartial companies vie for expertise.
MAI Capital Management has introduced an unorthodox rent to assist advance its inorganic progress technique, placing a longtime Barron’s government in control of strategic advisor recruiting.
The rent provides the Cleveland-based registered financial backing advisor, now majority-owned by Carlyle, a seasoned expertise scout because it hunts for advisor groups throughout the U.S.
Matt Barthel, who has formally joined MAI as managing accomplice, strategic advisor recruiting, will report back to managing accomplice Jim Kacic and work with the agency’s trade improvement staff, concentrating on lift-outs, the {industry} parlance for recruiting a complete advisory staff from a rival agency in a single transfer.
The appointment brings a recruiter who is aware of the {industry}’s high producers from the evaluating facet of the desk. As per the announcement by MAI, Barthel has practically 35 years in journalism and 20 years in wealth administration information operations, together with his tenure overseeing the monetary advisor rankings at Barron’s.
“One of our greatest initiatives is to draw the very best and brightest monetary advisors and convey them on board to broaden our attain within the market,” stated Rick Buoncore, MAI’s chairman and CEO.
The trade of advisor rankings had not too long ago was a flashpoint of dialog over the summer time, after news of a secret multimillion-dollar payment to a one-time editor at Forbes overseeing its high advisors record got here to mild. Morgan Stanley decided to drop out of the rankings following the revelations, whereas one other {industry} outlet reported Wells Fargo has suspended its participation in Forbes/Shook rankings.
Rankings vet joins MAI’s nationwide enlargement efforts
Barthel arrives as MAI enjoys a contemporary capital injection from Carlyle, which first gained publicity to the agency in 2021 by way of its stake in insurance coverage agency Galway Holdings. In March, that relationship expanded into Carlyle’s first majority-owned bet on an RIA through a deal that valued MAI at greater than $2.8 billion. At the time, Buoncore informed InvestmentInformation that roughly a 3rd of the agency’s fairness would stay in workers’ palms.
MAI reported about $77.3 billion in mixed consumer belongings as of April 30, 2026, with greater than 700 folks throughout over 40 places of work. Since January 2024 it has accomplished greater than 20 acquisitions, together with its largest-ever cope with Los Angeles-based Evoke Advisors, which roughly doubled MAI’s dimension and deepened its work with entertainment-industry and ultra-high-net-worth shoppers.
Since 2004, Barron’s has been within the trade of publishing advisor rankings, which over time expanded into 4 particular person lists together with its Top 100 Advisors, Top 100 Women Advisors, Top 100 Independent Advisors, and Top 1500 Advisors. The publication additionally publishes a Top RIA Firms record and two staff rankings masking personal wealth administration and institutional consulting groups, although the 2026 wave of the institutional consulting groups record would be the final for Barron’s.
According to his LinkedIn profile, Barthel’s historical past at Barron’s goes again to October 2007, spending his first 10 years as a “senior editor overseeing the journal’s monetary advisor rankings and its protection of the wealth administration {industry}.”
Last December, the SEC issued a advertising and marketing rule threat alert warned that advisors weren’t satisfying disclosure necessities for when “direct or oblique” compensation was despatched to third-party score suppliers, with advisors typically hyperlinking to disclosures slightly than assembly a requirement to provide them “clear and distinguished” placement alongside testimonials or rankings.
“[Third party rankings or awards] aren’t too arduous to return by for those who’re keen to pay to take part, but when favorable outcomes are introduced and an adviser needs to tout their rating, they are often reluctant to offer clear and distinguished disclosure indicating that they paid to take part or to be promoted throughout the survey,” Lori Weston, head of compliance at STP Investment Services, told InvestmentNews around that time. “Omitting this disclosure is clearly deceptive.”
Aside from MAI’s curiosity in RIAs and wirehouses, Barthel’s community might also serve the agency’s sports activities and leisure follow, which traces its roots in athlete wealth administration to the Nineteen Seventies.
“Matt is a ‘triple menace’ with deep ties to RIAs and wirehouse and sports-focused advisors. His experience and relationships throughout the monetary advisor panorama will play a serious position in our efforts to increase our advisor community in new areas and specialties to those that replicate our emphasis on catering to the wants of these we’re lucky to serve,” Buoncore stated.
Why are advisors transferring to RIAs?
MAI is recruiting in a market that favors its mannequin. Research from Cerulli Associates reveals that independent channels are reshaping how firms recruit advisors. Independent and hybrid RIAs held 27% of {industry} belongings in 2024, up from 21% a decade earlier.
“Advisor preferences clearly favor independence. 71% of advisors say they’d select an impartial channel in the event that they have been to change. Additionally, 88% of impartial RIAs say they’re very prone to stay affiliated with their present agency over the subsequent 12 months, and 97% point out they’d change to a different impartial RIA in the event that they did,” stated Stephen Caruso, affiliate director at Cerulli.
Private equity-backed acquirers have achieved a lot of the hiring, and consolidators have become the main engine of RIA recruiting. Cerulli initiatives that impartial RIA headcount will develop 11.8% by 2028. That is greater than double the 4.7% projected for impartial broker-dealers, the next-fastest-growing channel.
Culture because the recruiting filter
MAI says will probably be selective. “Cultural match isn’t only a precedence for us, it’s non-negotiable as a result of the energy and way forward for the agency are tied to our full staff reflecting MAI’s shared set of values,” Buoncore stated.
Barthel stated he was drawn by the agency’s trajectory.
“I’ve loved watching MAI’s ascension as a fast-growing and revered RIA, and I’m excited for the chance to play a key position in driving that progress,” he stated. “I’m wanting ahead to working with the staff and serving to main advisors within the {industry} discover a place the place they’re supported with the sources, experience and atmosphere they should thrive and to serve their shoppers in a holistic method.”
