Marty Flanagan is poised to take Invesco [profile] one step closer to becoming a "mini BlackRock," at least in the eyes of the Wall Street Journal.

Aaron Back of the WSJ ponders the possibility of Invesco buying Guggenheim's [profile] retail asset management business. Last week multiple publications reported that, per unnamed sources, the Invesco folks are in talks with the Guggenheim folks about buying Guggenheim's mutual fund and ETF business. The paper also wonders if Guggenheim might just sell its ETF business while hanging onto its bond fund business.

"Either way, the deal would solidify Invesco's position in the fastest-growth segment of the industry," the ETF business, the WSJ concludes. Invesco is the fourth biggest ETF shop in the U.S., per ETF.com's latest league table; Guggenheim is the eighth.

The rumored price tag on the deal is about $2 billion, against what the WSJ estimates is $65 billion in retail AUM at Guggenheim, which translates to about 3.1 percent of AUM. The paper compares that pricing to the current valuation of publicly traded ETF shop WisdomTree, which has a market cap equivalent to about 3 percent of its AUM. On the flip side, Invesco's current market cap of $14.14 billion is equivalent to about 1.6 percent its $858.3 billion in AUM. 

Edited by: Neil Anderson, Managing Editor


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