Hoge moves $3B-asset Truist team to Captrust, citing employee equity

A 13-person team covering $3 billion in client assets left Truist Investment Services for Captrust Financial Advisors, InvestmentNews first reported. Brett Hoge's Hoge-Barrett Group joined the Raleigh-based RIA along with advisors Alex Barrett, Josh Crane, Aaron Spivey, David Peterson and Harry Cross. The team is made up of five advisors, seven support staff and a portfolio manager, according to the report. Captrust oversees about $1.3 trillion in total assets under management and advisement.

Hoge told InvestmentNews he weighed launching his own independent firm backed by private equity and chose Captrust instead, drawn largely by the chance for his staff to own equity in the firm. "Could have had private equity back myself. We obviously have enough scale as a team, but I wanted to go to a platform that was ready for us, was ready to deliver the resources that the clients want," he said. Building operations from scratch as an independent, he added, would have delayed the resource boost he wanted clients to notice right away.

Captrust says just over 68% of its more than 2,000 employees hold a stake, and every employee has a pathway to equity. Scott Matheson, Captrust's managing director and head of client solutions, told InvestmentNews: "We put our money where our mouth is in terms of our equity." "We share equity as a part of the consideration of acquisitions, so that we are in fact partners from day one," Matheson said. Hoge framed the appeal as alignment: "Employee ownership creates a pretty powerful alignment. We wanted to invest alongside people and leaders we trust, which is Captrust, while creating some ownership opportunities for the team."

Employee ownership at Captrust sits alongside outside capital. Carlyle took a minority growth stake in 2023 and holds a seat on the parent company's board, and GTCR, which first invested in 2020, still indirectly owns more than 25% of Captrust, according to its SEC disclosures.

Equity is a recruiting lever across the industry. Schwab research found larger RIAs were more likely to offer equity to incoming advisors, InvestmentNews reported. Four Ameriprise teams and $10 billion or more moved to Schwab this year. Our previous coverage described that run as repricing the breakaway math for advisors weighing independence, custodian and package structure at once.