YouSaid · the spoken record

Brian Hamburger

lines on the record: 171
first: 2023-04-21
most recent: 2023-04-21
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Those small RAAs will be here throughout the duration of our lives. And the reason for that is probably not what you think. The reason for that is technology.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Right, when you're saying this is what objective counsel is going to cost, that's a tough check to stroke unless you're thinking about the brighter red head.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But that's only because your realtor sent you to someone who's charging $1,000 to do the closing for you, right? It's not really because you would have found them on your own. Here.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So here's the distinction that I've been able to cult together over the years that people that think of this as an investment, people that think of this as a business are apt to spend that money. They say, hey, there's a transaction cost and it's making sure I have good counsel to help optimize the transaction, mitigate risk, et cetera, et cetera. Think about brokers, even the most successful among them who have been sitting in a wirehouse throughout, you know, for decades, throughout their whole career, they've never written a check for any business endeavor. Right.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I too share your sentiments. I mean, of course, I'm biased. I think that you should never go into a novel financial transaction, particularly one that capitalizes the decades of goodwill and trust that you have developed throughout the course of your career without, number one, an objective party, right? Even if that's a knowledgeable friend of yours to say, what the heck are you thinking? And an experienced party, right? Someone who's been there before and knows what's important, you know, what needs to be handled urgently and what's everything else, right? What's the noise that we can kind of set to the side? It amazes me the transactions that people enter into without the benefit of objective experienced counsel. It really does.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Separate themselves. Right. So, really, at the end of the day, what do you own? You have a concentrated securities position. You better than me as the investment advisor can analyze the value of that security, right? You have all sorts of methods for doing that. And so. My job is to redirect your skills to be able to do that. And most of the time, they see that.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I mean, come on, you know our colleagues in this industry, right? They're very prideful group, right? Some may say that there's a big ego about them. And they're used to being the smartest folks in the room. And what shocks me. More than anything else that we've talked about today, what shocks me is how great investment advisors lose their when it comes to securities analysis of their own security.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You know I'm from Jersey, right? So we can't not share our opinion. It's part of who we are. It's how we're brought up. But I won't say that. What I'm going to say is. I'll say in a polite way, I'll say, What are you thinking? Right, because I'll say, what were your objectives? What do you think that this is going to fanatic?”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Like a felony in South America. Asking for a friend, right? Yeah, yeah, just asking for a friend. They want to talk about marital issues and is there any way. Yeah, yeah. Is there any way to own this while protecting it? They want to talk about a state issues. So anytime that there's that type of divide between would-be partners, big red flag, we have a whole service protocol to try and make sure that we can diffuse that. And that's not our information to share, but it needs to be shared.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I know what's coming every single time. It's a prior felony conviction that they haven't disclosed or sometimes out of there.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Makes the hair go up on the back of my neck is when we get off, we're about to close a call like that. And one of the people that are on the call will say, hey, Brian, can you hang on the line for a minute?”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No one's really a partner, right? And so what we try to force them to do is really get to know one another. Because within this team are a whole bunch of different dynamics, right? Someone needs to come clean that they're on the precipice of getting a divorce. Someone needs to come clean, that their financial affairs are just in complete disarray, right? Which when your colleagues in an office doesn't really matter. But if that's your business partner makes it harder, you damn well better know that they're going to be declaring bankruptcy within the next few months, right? And so these are the surprises. Is that legitimately happening?”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, their colleagues that are often seated with next to one another, often they have some type of fee-sharing arrangement among them. But there's this misnomer among them. They think they're partners. And I'm not here to burst anyone's bubble, but it comes out. You know, I force it out when we have some of our initial consults on the business startup because I'll ask them. Hey, Barry, do you know John's time horizon until he wants to retire?”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So the interesting thing with Teams, these are people who are typically employed by a brokerage firm They have worked together for many, many years. They are under this false belief that they're partners, right?”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Your car model, what did the firm pay to successfully acquire and integrate this firm? It's not how much did the original owner or founder put in their pocket? And then they don't look at the tax structure, right? And for many of these transactions, the tax structure is the one thing that can dictate the success or failure of these deals. Because it really makes a thin deal work really well if structured in the right way.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Afterwards, like this is not a one time transaction. I think the other big misnomer that's out there is people are fueled by these headline numbers. They're looking at these headlines. This firm just sold for 18x. This firm just sold for 20x. And they don't understand that deals are far more complicated than that, that there's a cash component, right? There are contingencies, there are retention components to any deal. And so when we look at those headline numbers, we're often looking at the total cost of ownership.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Listen, that doesn't often happen. You know what often happens is they come to us with this deal. And my first call to them was, I didn't even know you were in the market to sell. And by the way, the one firm that you're talking to seems to have none of the qualities that were important to you when you left your firm five years ago, right? So, you know, I'm a big fan of really understanding what the objectives are before we set out to do anything.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Perfectly, perfectly fine. But usually my job is to call up the CEO with the contra firm and to say, hey, I know you guys slipped one by the goalie on this one. I said, you know, and it's almost always met, Barry Wick. They laugh. They know. It's almost always met with, oh, we had no idea that you were working with them. Of course, it's not a problem.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“This becomes a problem, right? And it's actually. Typically, it's like an LOI, right? So it's not a legally binding document, but it's a goodwill problem, right? Because we work with so many other of these firms within the space. By the advisor signing that LOI, it's really the equivalent of a handshake. And if you're going to be in business with this firm for the next few decades at least, you don't want to start off by your attorney calling saying, hey, I know they signed this, but what they really meant was that, right? So I could tell you it just limits the ability for us to meaningfully affect the deal. We of course can continue to negotiate around the fringes and help mitigate risk and optimize the transaction to fit.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Personally, like where I spend my time is really in two primary areas in my practice. One is having that ongoing relationship with CEOs within this wealth management space and talking to them about their objectives and helping them navigate a path. So it doesn't happen in those circumstances. The other part of where I spend my time is fixing problems, right? This is a problem.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“How So you asked me before about the different practice areas we have. And that happens. All the time within our business transactions group.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And I think entrepreneurs really want to hone in on this. I think that's going to be a theme over the next few years is control because we have so many minority investments happening within the space. But even with a minority investment, these minority investors are demanding control provisions, right? Control is like the big tug of war that's happening nowadays. And when you look at a firm like Charles Firm at Dynasty, you see a firm that helps enable folks to run their own independent autonomous practice without having to give up that degree of control.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“They want all the features and the independence and autonomy of running their own business, right? Those firms are a great option for them, right? Suddenly within the independent space, you know going out and being independent doesn't mean that you have to go it alone, right? Whereas there are other firms are join opportunities where you're not going to have the autonomy of running your own firm. You're going to go and you're going to join these firms. You're going to be a quote-unquote partner in the firm or you're going to run one of these satellite affiliates within the firm, but make no mistake about it.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, I think the three examples you gave are three really different examples that probably satisfy a similar utility, a similar need or demand in the marketplace. When you look at firms like Dynasty, a single vendor platform provider for that entrepreneur who doesn't want to make So many of the decisions that naturally go with entrepreneurship, but”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Most people have the wherewithal to pull it off within the independent wealth management space. There's not a high barrier to entry. There's not significant licensing that takes place. And with the help of an objective advisor, I mean, this is not a very complex endeavor.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I believe that's the case. Yeah. And then you said, you know, are there going to be dominant players in the space? And I don't believe there ever will be. Really? And the reason for that is because there's such a low barrier to entry. Anyone who takes a nice hot long shower. Has an idea, right? And most of those people have the wherewithal to pull off.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Whole world that you and I can't even sit here and fathom, knowing where we've come from, to imagine what this is going to become in the next 10 or 20 years. I really think we're in the early innings.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I think, but they're actually going, they're leaving the public markets. And, you know, it looks like they're heading back to private. So that's an interesting transaction, right? One of the few firms to make their way into the public markets is actually, you know, some would say retreating, you know, others would say recapitalizing within the private markets. But they're the ones that have made their way over. Arguably, other firms like NFP have gone public, but that's not really a pure wealth management national financial partners, right? More an insurance focus. But I think we're in the early innings. I really do. I think that there is...”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Small In comparison to the entire securities industry. It wouldn't take much for one of these financial behemoths to become an aggregator themselves. And they've got far more financial might than any of these private capital providers out there.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I know All the time. It's a great one So you have a few questions there. The first one is we're in the early innings, right? Because even the giants of independent wealth management”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“My opinion is it's all self interest, right? Listen, you always start at the bottom of the article. I always look at the italicized print, right? Just like you started with the disclosures at the top of the show. Start with the italicized print. If I'm here from a roll-up or an aggregator and I tell you now's the time for you to sell to me because prices are at all time record highs, right? I got to, you know,”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You're happy, if you're a partner in life is happy with you and you've got time to spend with the people you love. If your clients love what's going on, if your employees are well cared for and they love working there, is growth an imperative? And if you read the trades, you would think. Everyone has to grow, right? You're going to grow or you're going to die, right?”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“See, I agree that scale helps, but what does scale help with? Scale helps with reducing the complexity that's largely come from growth. For the advisor with a few hundred million of assets under management, they don't need the scale. They're running a profitable business as it is, right? They're delivering outstanding service to their clients. If this is a lifestyle business, and I know that's kind of a dirty word because people want to say, oh, I'm not in a lifestyle business, right? It's okay. Like, you know, just where we always encourage people to do is start with their why. I know that sounds kind of corny.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Is getting paid first. There's a long way to go before Before that investment is affected. So I think they look at it as having insured upside potential with that ongoing annuity stream.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think that private capital likens it to an equity indexed annuity, right? Where there's no downside because they put in a pick. They put in a preferred income clause that gives them the ability to get paid first. So there's no market downturn risk, or I should say very low market downturn risk. When the minority investor or the capital partner paid for”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But I'm not quite sure it's just quantitatively or qualitatively better, right? Because how do you compete with the advisor who's got a couple hundred million dollars who knows the names of all their clients and all their kids, knows all their needs, goals, and objectives, is sitting down at the kitchen table with them every quarter. I mean, this is the career that we started in, right? I mean, this was what it looked like. And so I always ask, you know, better from what perspective, is it going to be better from the client perspective or better in terms of just more profitable business? And I don't quite know the answer to that.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Know, I think that there is a strong investment thesis. As to why to acquire these firms. We joked around about synergies before they talk about synergies. They talk about economies of scale. There's this foregone belief where people just like to jump to the fact that there is some type of scalable client experience out there that's really special. People don't necessarily describe how to get there, but they just say with more resources, we can build a better client experience, right? You could probably build better digital tools. You could probably build a better communications strategy, probably insert some AI that you could do some sophisticated things.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Listen, I think it has slowed down. I think interest rates are going to be probably the biggest driver there because, as you know, the capital becomes more expensive. But what shocked me more than the slowdown, the slowdown actually makes sense. What shocked me more than the slowdown was the intoxication of capital, right? And the fervor in which these firms, private capital, has been chasing investment advisors.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's the newsflag. Yeah, there are villages in New Jersey. Not many. When is that harvest? It was a lovely place to live for a short period Yeah, we were all in. We literally sold the house to finance the business. Wow.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“We had to sell the house. We had to do a for sale by owner because if we sold it using a broker, we would have been way underwater. So we literally printed up flyers, put them outside, put them all over town. We sold our house When I went to launch this firm, my daughter was six months old. And my wife was pregnant with We had two large dogs. Lo and behold, no one wanted to rent to us, so we ended up renting a log cabin on a vineyard.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So she said, Well, leave. And I said, How are we going to do that? We just bought this house. And she said, if not now, when?”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Punching the pillow. Yeah, meaning punching the pillow. And I said, It's probably my best option right now. And, you know, we looked at our situation. She was pregnant with our first child and we were expecting the target.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“22 years later, we see that law firms now do that. They just didn't do that in big numbers back then. And so she said to me, she said, well, are you just going to keep doing this? And I said, well,”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So I came up with this consulting concept and I pitched it to the firm's partnership. And I said, I really think that we would be able to do a great job for our RIA clients, for our wealth management clients, by having this consulting firm. And they rejected the idea. And I would come home from work and crack open a beer, sit on the back porch. And I don't do that every day. But I did it coming out of work there. And I would punch the pillow in the morning. I was just...”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I did. I did. And to this day, I'm grateful to my former wife for supporting that decision and actually coming up with the idea.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Unfortunately, no, but there are strategies that we do deploy in order to make that work. And it doesn't work for a whole variety of situations, depending upon how restrictive their current employment situation is. But when you say, you know, that seems awfully restrictive, keep in mind these are rules written by a self-regulatory organization comprised of broker dealers.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And it's in force, right? And so you can decide that you want to sever your employment and then begin the startup work, but that's not tenable for most people.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Doesn't even matter if it says CC regulated. The fact that they are, let's say, in preparation for launching this new firm, they are acquiring 100% of the membership interests of an LLC or 100% of the stock of a corporation.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, yeah, there's definitely issues with their employment and employment transition, right? What can and they can't do while they are currently gainfully employed elsewhere? That captive employment restricts them often far more than they know, but they can't engage in an outside business activity, right? They can't engage in selling away. The big one that they get hung up on is they can engage in a private securities transaction without getting the prior written consent of the firm. Now you may say, Barry, well, how is this a private securities transaction?”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, yes and no, right? I mean, so market council consulting will work with firms on really understanding their scope of services, taking inventory over their conflicts of interest, drafting out fee schedules, investment strategy, a lot of it is disclosure-based, right? And so we'll work on creating all the disclosures. obviously handling all of the registrations, the regulatory reporting that needs to be done, drafting a compliance manual and installing an initial compliance program. All of that work is handled by market counsel. For most of the clients that come to us for startup work, right? And that program we call it the RA incubator, right? Which is a really, I think, describes what it does. But for almost all the clients that come to us, They're not coming from a very pure place where they can just engage in that activity.”
2023-04-21 · Masters in Business · Brian Hamburger on Surging Merger Business in RIAs · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source