Orion-Brinker Deal Is Done (Already)

The merger between Orion Advisor Solutions and Brinker Capital has closed, the firms announced Friday, less than three months after they announced the deal.

In stark contrast, Charles Schwab announced in late 2019 that it planned to buy TD Ameritrade, and that deal has yet to be finalized.

“Yes, it’s faster than a lot of deals,” Joel Bruckenstein, head of the Technology Tools for Today (T3) hub, said in a phone interview about the completion of the Orion-Brinker merger. But “it doesn’t surprise me,” he said, adding it was “beneficial to both firms to get it done as quick as possible and move forward.”

But he said the Schwab-TD Ameritrade deal was not a valid comparison to make, calling that a “massive deal” that involved “antitrust considerations.”

Echoing him, industry consultant Tim Welsh of Nexus Strategy said by email that the “Schwab-TD deal had so many regulatory and potential antitrust issues, and is at a much bigger scale, which creates an extremely long runway which could take half a decade or more to finally become integrated.”

The Orion-Brinker deal highlights “the benefits of having private equity involved in that they are experienced at dealmaking and closing transactions quickly,” Welsh said, adding: “It also points out the many synergies involved in this strategic deal to create a true TAMP powerhouse.”

Orion was also likely “sitting on additional investment now from” the recent recapitalization by financial partner TA Associates, while Brinker was likely “ready to make the move as quickly as possible given the upside for them to work with Orion’s clients,” according to Doug Fritz, founder and president of F2 Strategy.