Feb 1, 2009 12:00 PM

, By John Churchill

By John Churchill

These days everyone is suffering. The media has been all over the story of the credit bust, the drop in housing values, the stock market's dive since Labor Day, and how these events have wiped out the American Dream. Financial advisors and other employees of the large publicly traded firms also have seen their retirement savings wiped out as their firms' stock prices plummeted — all that has been well-documented in news stories, too.

But there is another group of people suffering as well, albeit very quietly, lest they attract unwanted attention: registered investment advisors (RIAs). As their clients' assets plummet, so do the revenues of their firms. That's not surprising, of course, but the problem is that many RIAs who sold stakes to “roll -up” or “consolidator” firms are now scrambling to pay quarterly disbursements to these firms.