Kestra Holdings is a leading national wealth management platform providing financial advice to clients as well as essential business infrastructure to financial advisors.

Kestra empowers independent financial professionals across the country in delivering comprehensive securities, trust and investment advisory services to their clients. Kestra operates through its growing affiliate (“Kestra Financial”) and owned channels (“Bluespring Wealth Partners”) for fee-based financial advisors. Kestra is based in Austin, TX.

INDUSTRY KNOWLEDGE & NETWORK

Kestra (formerly known as NFP Advisor Services) was initially formed in 2000 within National Financial Partners (NFP) to provide the company’s insurance brokers with a broker-dealer platform to enable them to sell investment securities. As the business grew, it began to service independent financial advisors outside of NFP, evolving into a national wealth management platform. NFP and Kestra management decided that the business was non-core to NFP’s legacy insurance brokerage operations and were looking for a partner to support the business through its spinout from the parent and invest in the platform and team in order to help the company continue to scale and grow. In June 2016, Stone Point completed a recapitalization of the business, becoming the company’s new majority shareholder, with NFP and Kestra management retaining a significant minority equity stake. NFP and Kestra management opted to work with Stone Point on this transaction given our significant experience within the wealth management space as well as our expertise in supporting portfolio companies through additional capital and support for tuck-in acquisitions. As part of our initial investment in Kestra, Stone Point leveraged its deep network within asset and wealth management to make several strategic introductions to Kestra, including leading asset managers, technology vendors and key industry executives. Stone Point supported the business through its rebranding from NFP Advisor Services into Kestra and was helpful in crafting the go-forward marketing strategy in order to position Kestra within the industry as a differentiated platform with a focus on a high quality, highly productive advisors.

OPERATIONAL ASSISTANCE & GOVERNANCE

Stone Point supported Kestra as it made significant technological improvements to its platform. This helped cement Kestra’s position as one of the industry’s most productive advisors and turned the company’s technology into a key competitive advantage when recruiting new advisors. In addition, Stone Point helped Kestra build a high-quality investment platform supported by centralized due-diligence specialists and third-party partners, hired a dedicated head of retirement services, and added trust services to Kestra’s offerings through an acquisition.

M&A SOURCING

Stone Point worked with Kestra to develop a multi-pronged M&A effort and establish an acquisition platform. Stone Point helped Kestra source and execute 23 acquisitions, which has expanded Kestra’s market presence in key services and helped increase the company’s EBITDA by ~300% since the time of Stone Point’s initial investment.

EXECUTIVE RECRUITING & ALIGNMENT

Following the spinout from NFP, Stone Point assisted Kestra with the recruitment of an experienced CFO as well as an operations leader. Stone Point also helped Kestra expand its recruiting team and started an internal sales desk to further lead generation.

CAPITAL RAISING & STRUCTURING

Stone Point facilitated the company’s third-party debt financings, which have been critical in the company’s ability to successfully execute on its M&A strategy. Stone Point, alongside Kestra, also led a minority recapitalization with a longstanding Stone Point relationship that resulted in liquidity for both Kestra management and Trident while strengthening the company’s equity base and access to additional capital.