The venerable Thomson Reuters platform and parts of Civantage, among others, are changing hands again.
Private equity firm Clearlake Capital and Motive Partners on Monday announced their agreement to acquire three technology offerings from Refinitiv, a part of the London Stock Exchange Group, for $1.1 billion. Those products include Refinitiv’s Beta, Maxit and Digital Investor offerings. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Also part of the announcement was a strategic partnership with LSEG.
Thomson Reuters owned Refinitiv until private equity firm Blackstone Group Inc acquired a majority stake in it in 2018. Blackstone and Thomson Reuters sold Refinitiv to LSEG in January 2021 for all-stock transactions worth between $20 billion and $27 billion (Refinitiv). , across its multiple product lines, 40,000 customers, 400,000 end users in 190 countries and reported to have $6.25 billion in annual revenue).
The Maxit product (an end-to-end tax information reporting solution) was brought to Refinitiv two years ago during the acquisition of Civantage in March 2020.
Clearlake Capital & Motive Partners’ desire for “the existing portfolio company, InvestCloud,” and all parties “to offer new products and greater operational efficiencies to customers across these various platforms, was briefly mentioned in Monday’s announcement.”
Will Trout, director of Javelin Strategy & Research’s wealth management division, sees both the opportunity and the hard work ahead to realize those cross-platform potential.
“I think Investcloud will be the main beneficiary of this deal, both in terms of establishing goodwill in the broker-dealer world and signing on major clients like Wells Fargo Advisors and Jenny Montgomery Scott, both of whom use the platform,” she said. .
“There has to be some hard work to be done in terms of integrating the beta into InvestCloud, however, it should be the direction that Motive takes. But it makes sense,” Trout said.
Catera Roll Out Distribution Phase Tool
Realizing that retirement income tools can both benefit customers and serve as good marketing, Cetera Financial Group on Wednesday announced the availability of advanced time splits.
This tool is intended to help consultants “solve the retirement income challenge” in working with clients. It will be available only to financial professionals associated with Cetera and is part of the Growth360 program launched by Cetera last year.
Cetera says that using the tool can not only help consultants tackle a daunting problem (tracing the client’s deaccumulation phase), but may prove to be a differentiator and driver of growth, citing its own internal study. .
Although they did not provide the total number of consultants in the study, Citera found that “those using the ATS report increased their assets under management by 41% and their assets under administration by 28% and 20%, compared to 28% and 20% more.” 27% year over year, respectively, for those not using ATS.”
Sustainable Farmland Fund Launched by FarmTogether
Startup FarmTogether, a member of the Franklin Templeton-backed Evonexus fintech incubator, announced on Wednesday the launch of its Sustainable Farmland Fund.
The fund, which is meant for accredited investors, will provide a pool of diversified, pre-selected agricultural assets.
The startup, which is headquartered in San Francisco, launched in 2017 and now has $175 million in assets under management, according to a company spokesperson.
Prior to the fund’s launch, FarmTogether’s other offerings included its crowdfunding products (which give investors flexibility within the management structure, geographic regions or crops they choose), a 1031 exchange, and bespoke offerings from sole proprietorships.
The fund has a target net IRR of 8% to 10% and a net annual target distribution of 4% to 6%. The minimum investment is $100,000, and the minimum hold period is two years.
FarmTogether’s fund will invest in a range of agricultural opportunities in major U.S. growing regions, including tree nuts, citrus, and apples, in both permanent and row crops.
For now the firm has partnerships with several self-directed IRA custodian trust companies as well as RocketDollar and Alto IRAs.
FarmT completely overlaps with startup AcreTrader and its mission to simplify investment in agricultural land.
Tifin Expands Lewis Tifin With Amicus.io Acquisition
Fintech incubator and holding company Tiffin on Tuesday announced plans to expand its Lewis Charitable Giving Platform for advisors.
Enhancements to Lewis will include a multi-custodial platform, SOC2 security compliance, as well as expanded investment options that include a custom model portfolio. Other parts of the roadmap include the ability for advisors to create long-term family giving plans that include contribution and gift goals.
Part of the impetus for new growth comes from Tifin’s recent acquisition of Amicus.io.
Vinay Nair, CEO and Founder, Tiffin, said, “With the acquisition of Amicus, we now have a modernized set of pipes powering Lewis, which allows all advisors to offer Lewis to all our clients.”
