This week I’m looking at a trio of stories from the wealthtech beat: SS&C’s completed acquisition of Calastone, the emergence of a new UK-based wealthtech, and a look at two, not-quite-contrasting interpretations of funding for wealthtechs in Q3 2025.
SS&C Technologies completes $1 billion acquisition of Calastone
Initially reported in July, SS&C Technologies announced this week that it has completed its acquisition of Calastone. The company purchased Calastone, a London-based, international funds network and provider of technology solutions to wealth and asset managers, from global investment firm Carlyle for a price of £766 million ($1.03 billion). The transaction was funded via a combination of debt and cash.
“Calastone’s network and technology further strengthen SS&C’s leadership across global fund operations,” Chairman and CEO of SS&C Technologies Bill Stone said. “Together, we will accelerate innovation for our clients, expand our reach, and continue to simplify the way the industry operates.”
The acquisition will bolster SS&C’s solutions for fund administration, transfer agency, AI, and intelligent automation. The union will also facilitate the launch of a unified, real-time operating platform to lower costs, complexity, and operational risk for fund industry participants while providing enhanced distribution, investor servicing, and operational scalability.
Founded in 1986 and headquartered in Windsor, Connecticut, SS&C Technologies provides mission-critical, cloud-based solutions to more than 22,000 companies in financial services and healthcare. A member of the Fortune 1000 and a publicly traded firm on the NASDAQ under the ticker SSNC, SS&C Technologies is the largest independent hedge fund and private equity administrator, and the largest mutual fund transfer agency, in the world.
Calastone runs the largest global funds network, linking more than 4,500 financial organizations worldwide across 57 markets. The company processes more than £250 billion ($334 billion) of investment value each month, and maintains offices in Luxembourg, Hong Kong, Taipei, Singapore, New York, and Sydney. With the completed acquisition, Calastone’s 250 employees will join SS&C Global Investor & Distribution Solutions, effective immediately.
“This is an exciting new chapter for Calastone,” company CEO Julien Hammerson said. “Joining SS&C gives our clients and employees access to greater scale, investment, and opportunity. We’re proud of what we’ve built and look forward to contributing to SS&C’s continued growth and global success.”
UK wealthtech Clove emerges from stealth
London-based wealthtech Clove has emerged from stealth with €12 million ($14 million) in pre-seed funding in its coffers. The round, which was led by Accel, is regarded as one of the largest early-stage financings for a European startup this year. Kindred Capital VC and Air Street Capital also participated in the investment, along with a handful of angel investors.
“With Clove, we are seeking to break the traditional economics of financial advice by combining the expertise of human advisers with the efficiency of AI,” Co-Founder Alex Loizou said. “Our goal is to make financial planning more accessible, affordable, and effective than ever before, for everyone from young professionals and aspiring entrepreneurs, to growing families and those starting to think about retirement.”
Clove was launched by Loizou and fellow founder Christian Owens at a time when the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority has determined that professional financial advice can make a significant difference—as much as 10%—in financial outcomes compared to those who do not have access to this advice. Loizou and Owens see an opportunity to provide this advice via a combination of human insight and AI intelligence.
“Our aim is to make it possible to deliver high-quality, personalized advice at an unprecedented scale,” Owens wrote on the Clove blog. “As we started exploring this problem we discovered that most of what financial advisers do isn’t actually advice, it’s admin. By using AI to reduce that burden, we hope to give advisers more time to do what they are trained to do: help people make better decisions.”
Clove will use the funding to hire additional talent ahead of a full launch in 2026, subject to FCA authorization.
Smaller, but busier? Wealthtech deal activity up, total funding down in Q3 YoY
According to FinTech Global Research, wealthtech investments in the US dropped significantly year over year in Q3 2025. Deal activity was robust by comparison, with 71 deals in Q3 2025 compared to 62 deals in Q3 2024, but total funding dropped to $861 million this year in the third quarter compared to $1.8 billion raised in Q3 2024. The average deal value also declined, falling to $12.1 million this year from an average of $28.8 million in Q3 2024.
The analysts cited “persistent macroeconomic uncertainty” and, interestingly, “evolving wealth management technologies” for what it said was a cautious, “lower-risk” approach by investors.
To that final point, there may be reason for optimism. Looking out over a longer time frame, the CB Insights State of Fintech Q3’25 Report noted that wealthtech funding was “maintaining momentum” and on track to double 2024 totals, having already topped 2024 levels. In fact, CB Insights highlighted “strong confidence in digital-first wealth management solutions” and vigorous hiring as positive signs. The report noted that financial advisor productivity tools, wealth management banking and lending platforms, and AI investment intelligence platforms were among the top sectors in fintech in terms of headcount growth year-over-year.
Photo by Morgan Housel on Unsplash
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