From Schwab IMPACT® 2018, I connected with John Connor, Vice President of Digital Advisor Solutions for Schwab Advisor Services to tour the “Tech Alley” section of The Exchange exhibit hall.
From Schwab IMPACT® 2018, I connected with Andrew Salesky, Senior Vice President of Digital Advisor Solutions for Schwab Advisor Services to first get to know more about his background and role within Charles Schwab.
We then covered two of the “blocking and tackling” technology initiatives within Schwab Advisor Services: Digital Account Open and Schwab Advisor Portfolio Connect™.
We wrap up our conversation with what Schwab is doing internally to stay on the leading edge of financial technology and future updates to the Schwab Advisor Services platform.
Welcome to the FPPad fintech briefing, Here are the top fintech stories you need to know today.
Brokerage Websites Offline During Market Volatility
With huge increases in market volatility this week, brokerage customers have experienced unresponsive websites from some of the largest providers like Fidelity, Charles Schwab and Vanguard as well as smaller automated investment services Betterment and Wealthfront. According to Bloomberg, brokerage companies acknowledged that customers did lose access for short periods of time on Monday, but as trading activity subsided, account access was restored to all customers by Tuesday morning.
Personal Capital Adds Socially Responsible Personal Strategy®
In socially responsible investing news, Personal Capital is hopping on the responsible investing bandwagon with the addition of its new Socially Responsible Personal Strategy®. The strategy screens US equities based on environmental, social, and governance factors powered by Sustainalytics data to generate investment strategies that align with customers’ socially responsible preferences. Personal Capital joins Betterment, Wealthfront, Motif Investing, OpenInvest, and many others to help investors align their portfolios with their socially conscious preferences.
AdvisoryWorld Update on ACQUIRE Solution
And how do you stay up to date on what’s new this year in fintech? Well if you visit the FPPad YouTube channel, you’ll see the first batch of dozens of interviews filmed with fintech solution providers at last week’s National LINC conference, including a conversation about an updated from Advisory World called ACQUIRE. Here’s AdvisoryWorld COO Mike Wilson with the details.
We continue to work on what we refer to as ACQUIRE, which is our digital onboarding component. With that, advisors are able to embed links on their websites and social media accounts that helps get new business through the doors. It’s a questionnaire that points, again, to a model.
More interviews are being uploaded to the FPPad YouTube channel every day, so visit fppad.com/flashbriefing to get all the links to today’s top stories.
I’m Bill Winterberg, and those are your fintech headlines for today from FPPad.com, be sure to check back in with me later for more fintech news.
On today’s broadcast, Betterment raises $100 million in fresh capital, Fidelity tests FidelityGo, Schwab pulls the plug on OpenView Integrated Office, and more.
First, a heads up, Steve and I will be on the road later this month covering the massive NAB 2016 event, scouring the exhibit halls for technology you can use to make great videos and podcasts, followed by the 2016 Shareholders Service Group conference in San Diego. Visit fppad.com/subscribe and sign up today so you don’t miss any of our coverage from the events.
[Now on to this week’s top story which comes from Betterment, as the automated investment service raised another $100 million dollars in venture capital, bringing the total amount they’ve raised to $205 million. Betterment is pulling away from a crowded field of robo competitors, now servicing over 150,000 customers, managing $3.9 billion in assets, and valued at a reported $700 million.
Betterment says they will use the funding to grow the Betterment for Business 401(k) platform and the Betterment Institutional offering for you, the financial advisor.
But despite all the money raised and what they say about being their customer’s central financial relationship, Betterment’s questionnaire still doesn’t tell customers that they should pay off high interest credit card debt or build up an emergency fund first before investing. Oh, that’s right, customers can find that advice somewhere on the blog.
So I’ll reiterate what I posted on Twitter this week: Betterment, I hope you use the money to make unbiased fiduciary advice accessible & affordable to everyone.
If you want to read more about the latest round of Betterment’s funding, head over to fppad.com/183 for the links to this week’s top stories.] Today marks an important milestone for Betterment and our more than 150,000 customers who have invested over $3.9 billion with us. We’re excited to announce that Betterment has closed a $100 million investment, led by a new partner, Kinnevik.
[Next up is news from Fidelity, as the company announced plans to begin testing Fidelity Go, its own automated investing service for retail investors, with roughly 500 customers this week, with an official rollout sometime in the second half of this year.
If you remember back to November of 2015, Fidelity broke off its relationship to promote Betterment Institutional to advisors, and then coincidentally announced the Fidelity Go retail product that competes more or less with Betterment. Fidelity Go will feature investment portfolios managed by Geode Capital Management, all in fees at 39 basis points or lower, automatic rebalancing, but no tax loss harvesting.
With Fidelity Go as a retail offering, you should know that Fidelity told me that a B2B version is under development, and while they couldn’t give me a solid release date, they did say the offering will be customized to your needs as an advisor.
Nevertheless, Fidelity joins Charles Schwab as an institutional custodian with an automated investment solution in the retail space, but at no platform fee in exchange for a little extra cash allocation, Schwab Intelligent Portfolios, in my opinion, is going to be tough to beat.] Fidelity Investments, the second-largest U.S. mutual fund company, will test an automated-investment service starting Wednesday on a small group of existing customers. Fidelity plans to offer the service to the public in the second half of this year.
[And speaking of Schwab, this week’s final story is news that Schwab Advisor Services is discontinuing the Schwab OpenView Integrated Office solution effective July 31. Roughly 150 firms are using the solution, so they’re going to have to find some other technology to replace Integrated Office, specifically the custom version of Salesforce that came with it.
The link to the story at fppad.com/183 has the details on options for affected advisors, including using Salesforce with Schwab OpenView Gateway or migrating to a completely new CRM, but here’s the angle I want to focus address.
This is absolutely an example of what can happen when you choose a custodian’s proprietary solution for a part of your technology. How committed is that custodian going to be to offer that technology over the lung run? In this case, Schwab, for whatever reason, is shutting down Integrated Office, leaving 150 advisors with just three months to figure out what to do.
So I don’t blame you one bit for getting a little uneasy when custodians offer proprietary technology solutions to you that they own and control. But with more custodian acquisitions of technology on the horizon, I’m afraid this is a risk you’re going to have to assume more frequently as time moves on.
One more thing: if you want a firm with Salesforce experience in financial services, get your pencils out, because you should consider contacting LiquidHub, Concenter Services, Navatar, Salentica, or AppCrown.] One hundred fifty Charles Schwab advisors must find a new client relationship manager (CRM) by July 31.
Here are stories that didn’t make this week’s broadcast:
Envestnet | Tamarac has launched four major software updates designed to strengthen RIAs’ online engagement with clients. The roll-out is part of the firm’s March 2016 technology release.
Laser App Software, the premier provider of forms automation and management software for the securities and insurance industries, has announced that Advyzon, an all in one cloud-based platform combining portfolio management, performance reporting, CRM, client portal and planning, integrated with Laser App Software to enhance its client dashboard.
Our team has been hard at work creating the AdvisorQA mobile product experience for Financial Services. It provides a new mobile Content Management and Social Collaboration tool that utilizes the cognitive computing and research capabilities of IBM Watson.
On today’s broadcast, Schwab releases Institutional Intelligent Portfolios™ into the advisor marketplace, Advent rolls out a new advisor experience for Black Diamond, and TD Ameritrade Institutional assembles dozens of vendors in Chicago to help you move your business forward.
Today’s episode is brought to you by Autopilot, the only automated asset management platform built on the power of the Risk Number™.
Powered by CLS Investments and Riskalyze, Autopilot empowers advisors to revolutionize their business model, profitably service clients of all sizes, and democratize access to investment advice with a client service platform embedded directly in your firm’s existing website. Sign up for a demo today by visiting fppad.com/autopilot.
[This week’s top story comes from Schwab Advisor Services, as the company officially rolled out its Institutional Intelligent Portfolios™ solution to advisors that was first mentioned back in episode 158, which I will try to link right over here. One change of note is that Schwab increased the number of available ETFs to more than 450 from the original 200 announced back in March, but the platform fees remain unchanged.
So I looked into the disclosure materials and uncovered a few items that I think you should know. First, anytime a new client signs up, you, the advisor, are required to make a final decision to select a portfolio strategy for that client. Until you make that decision, your clients’ cash will be held in the sweep program.
Second, accounts over $50,000 are eligible for tax-loss harvesting, but hold on, you, the advisor, must use the software built in to Institutional Intelligent Portfolios™ to activate and implement the tax-loss harvesting strategy.
And third, at any time, clients can authorize you, the advisor, to suspend trading due to “market conditions” and then reactivate trading “when the Advisor decides it is appropriate to do so.”
So I don’t know about you, but this sounds like Institutional Intelligent Portfolios™ doesn’t really streamline any of your portfolio management activities, it may actually increase your workload a bit, which is ironic given the automated focus of the program. It’s definitely not a set-and-forget automated solution, and for this added workload in your business you’ll earn how much in new revenue? That’s what I thought.
And before I forget, Schwab says that the system “will not monitor the type and amount of capital gains” so you’ll have to manage that information in a separate solution, say Schwab Advisor Portfolio Connect or perhaps PortfolioCenter, if you want to report on the gains and losses in each client account. Oh, one more thing, as of today, the mobile app isn’t yet ready.
But to be fair, this is version 1.0 of the solution for advisor, so if anyone is listening out there, maybe you can get Schwab to acknowledge these opportunities to make Institutional Intelligent Portfolios™ an attractive technology solution for your business.]
[Next up is news from Advent, as the company held AdventConnect, it’s annual advisor conference in Las Vegas last week. The company used the event to showcase the next generation Black Diamond® wealth platform, which was being called “BD3” during internal development.
Gone from the Black Diamond name are the Performance Reporting label and the old widgets and BlueSky titles, which is now being replaced by the wealth platform description that represents the radical refresh of the advisor experience.
The main advisor dashboard now uses tiles that you can customize based on the information you want at a glance, portfolio performance graphs are much more streamlined, report pages contain relevant portfolio data without being overly crowded and busy, and a presentation mode is now built in to give you a way to walk through reports while redacting confidential client data.
Advent also announced a new initiative called Black Diamond Link, which adds “bi-directional, workflow-oriented integrations” with a variety of third party technology providers, including MoneyGuidePro, AdvisoryWord, XLR8, Junxure Cloud, Advisors Assistant, and Redtail Technology.] On the heels of last year’s unveiling and this year’s rollout of the new Black Diamond® investor experience, Advent today showcased its next generation Black Diamond® wealth platform. The next generation platform which has been dubbed “BD3” by clients and the development team, as it represents the third generation of the Black Diamond® platform, has been a multi-month effort to redesign and reinvent Black Diamond® to go beyond its roots in performance reporting.
[If integrations with best-in-breed solutions sounds familiar, that’s because TD Ameritrade Institutional offers a similar platform under Veo Open Access, Schwab Advisor Services offers OpenView Gateway, and Pershing announced its own API store just a few weeks ago.
And for custodian-agnostic integration providers, Orion Advisor Services has been offering integrations to their advisors for several years. Full disclosure, you should watch my first vlog about Orion. So Advent, welcome to the club!
Now speaking of integrations, I’m going to wrap up with news from TD Ameritrade Institutional, as the company held its 6th annual technology summit in Chicago this week for Veo Open Access integrated solution providers. The number of solution providers now stands at 91 representing over $300 billion in assets advised across all of the technology solutions.
I’m running out of time for this broadcast, and I made a vlog about my trip to the Tech Summit in Chicago, so just watch the vlog and you’ll be up to speed on how this custodian is helping advisors like you take their business to the next level.] To help independent registered investment advisors (“RIAs”) keep pace in an era of accelerating technology change, TD Ameritrade Institutional1 has pursued a unique strategy of collaboration, harnessing the innovative and cutting-edge work of an entire community of technology leaders through its Veo Open Access vendor network.
On today’s broadcast, Schwab Intelligent Portfolios gathers over $500 million dollars in its first few weeks, find out why Orion Advisor Services is regarded as one of the good fintech vendors, and personal dossier app Refresh gets acquired by LinkedIn.
Today’s episode is brought to you by Wealthbox CRM. Be the first to see the release of Wealthbox version 1.8 with a ton of new features and integrations, including one with MoneyGuidePro.
Sign up for a free trial of Wealthbox CRM in just 15 seconds to see what the buzz is about at Wealthbox.com.
[For the second week in a row, this week’s top story comes from Charles Schwab, as the company told InvestmentNews that it gathered “considerably over” $500 million in assets in the new Schwab Intelligent Portfolios program.
Schwab Intelligent Portfolios was released to retail investors just three weeks ago, which you heard three episodes ago, and now they have over $500 million. And just four weeks ago, my broadcast covered Wealthfront’s news that they surpassed $2 billion dollars in assets under management.
So it took Wealthfront a little over three years to get to two billion dollars, and Schwab Intelligent Portfolios is on pace to do it in about two months. NOW who’s going to be the fastest growing and most trusted automated investment service in the world? I think that title’s up for grabs.
But hold on: there’s a deeper story here. Your business is experiencing grocery store econ 101. That’s right, it’s all about shelf space. You might have the best business in the world, but if you don’t have any shelf space, you don’t even have a chance to step up to the plate.
So all of these new solutions online are taking up shelf space and they’re crowding you out of the market. Sure, investors are getting low fees, rebalancing, even tax loss harvesting, but are they getting any REAL advice that actually matters? Not from what I can tell. But what I do see is that your shelf space is slowly being eroded, so you better start doing something about that today.
You can start by sharing this broadcast to your colleagues. Go on, the button’s down there, or up in the corner. Use it.] The Charles Schwab & Co. robo-adviser has crossed a symbolic threshold in just three weeks, raising more than half a billion dollars, the San Francisco-based firm told InvestmentNews on Monday.
[Next up is news on Orion Advisor Services, as this week Joel Bruckenstein highlighted the portfolio accounting service bureau for a number of the company’s innovations in financial technology.
Here are the most relevant updates from Bruckenstein’s column. Orion now serves over 570 advisory firms who collectively process over $200 billion in assets, and the company expects to add another 280 firms this year.
Bruckenstein highlights many of Orion’s innovations, including its free private labeled mobile app for advisors, video client statements powered by Engage, and trading sleeve capabilities in its order management system.
Bruckenstein also writes that Orion exhibits a company culture of innovation, which you saw first hand from my Fuse 2014 hackathon coverage, which is an event the company will repeat once again this September.
To be fair, Orion’s competitor Envestnet | Tamarac has also recently achieved some significant milestones, as the company now serves over 800 advisory firms with over $500 billion dollars on the platform, and they also offer a custom branded iPad app for use by advisors and clients. So remember what I said about shelf space and competition? Both of these companies, plus many other technology providers, will put you in a position to differentiate yourself in a crowded market.] When pondering this month’s column, I thought it might be interesting to focus on a single firm whose story involved all of these trends, Orion Advisor Services, which offers “software as a service” and portfolio accounting services to RIAs.
[And finally, I’m wrapping up this broadcast by revisiting Refresh, an app I told you about way back in episode 107. Refresh is an app that creates a real-time dossier about people you’re going to meet, pulling information from a variety of sources to help you, well, refresh your memory about your connections.
This week, Refresh announced that it will be acquired by LinkedIn (probably because of the Bits and Bytes bump!), so the company will soon be sunsetting its standalone app and rolling in its dossier capabilities into LinkedIn. I’m pretty happy about this move, because Refresh has been one of my go-to apps for a while, and I’m glad to see how the technology can enhance the value of LinkedIn as all of us continue to develop meaningful relationships with clients and colleagues everywhere.] Today, I’m excited to announce that Refresh has been acquired by LinkedIn.
Here are the stories that didn’t make this week’s broadcast:
External IT, a cloud-based IT outsourcing firm that focuses on RIAs and Broker Dealers, today announced a new capability to be part of its best-in-class Cloud Desktop solution. The enhancement to the recently redesigned platform creates a visual and easily readable interface to view user activity that tracks login location, IP address, time and device, along with the specific applications launched.
On today’s broadcast, Schwab and Wealthfront duke it out over automated investment supremacy, Fidelity wants to be the first final app for Apple Watch, and learn what screencasting app I use to delegate work so I can be more efficient.
Today’s episode is brought to you by Croesus, the affordable all-in-one portfolio management & CRM software for RIAs. Over 9,500 investment professionals use the Croesus application to manage more than $700 billion in assets, and Croesus is offering a 50% discount on set-up fees for Advent Axys users until June 30th.
To learn more about Croesus or to sign up for a free trial, visit fppad.com/croesus.
[This weeks top story features, no surprise, Charles Schwab and Wealthfront, as this week many of us witnessed round one of what could easily be a 12-round match between the industry heavyweight and the up-and-coming contender. Allow me to bring you up to speed in less than 60 seconds:
In June of 2014, Wealthfront crossed a billion dollars in AUM and paid homage to Charles Schwab for building a world-class company (foreshadowing). Then in October, Schwab announced it would release it’s own automated investment service called Schwab Intelligent Portofolios™ in the first quarter of 2015, and offer it with no management fees. So in January of this year, details emerged that Schwab Intelligent Portfolios generally will have higher cash positions than similar allocation strategies, allowing Schwab to earn revenue on cash that is swept to Schwab Bank. This week, Schwab officially rolled out Intelligent Portfolios on Monday, so on Tuesday, Wealthfront’s CEO Adam Nash criticized Schwab, remember, the same company he venerated just 9 months ago (does that count as a another pivot?), citing high cash allocations as quote “almost criminal.” Schwab countered on Wednesday, saying Nash was misleading and quote “presented a very loose interpretation of facts.” Now you’re up to date, and with a little bit of time to spare!
So why is this news for you? According to Schwab’s press release, the company plans to release Institutional Intelligent Portfolios™ in the second quarter, a version of the service that allows financial advisors who custody client assets with Schwab to use the solution with their own firms’ branding.
For a yet-to-be-disclosed fee (here’s a hint: I bet it’s 25 basis points), advisors can modify and customize asset allocations in Institutional Intelligent Portfolios™, or they can choose to use existing portfolios for no program management fee.
And second, while Schwab and Wealthfront battle it out, you have a huge opportunity to get in front of investors caught up in this story to communicate how you’re different from automated investment services. Yes, you do offer portfolio management, but you offer so much more, so it’s time you start controlling the conversation instead of allowing others to control the conversation about you.] Charles Schwab today launched a fully automated investment advisory service, Schwab Intelligent Portfolios™, the only investment advisory service using sophisticated computer algorithms to build, monitor, and rebalance diversified portfolios based on an investor’s stated goals, time horizon and risk tolerance – without charging any advisory fees, commissions or account services fees.
[Next up is news from Fidelity Investments, as this week the company rode the wave of interest in the Apple Watch announcement by revealing a financial app for the new product. If you remember waaaay back in my third episode, I told you about Fidelity’s Market Monitor app for the ill-fated Google Glass, so it’s not surprising that the financial services company is also leading the industry on embracing Apple’s foray into wearable computing.
So again, what’s the takeaway for you? While Google Glass has floundered perhaps for being a little too intrusive, the Apple Watch and other devices on your wrist may actually lead to some incremental productivity increases in your daily routines. So will Apple Watch prove to be popular among advisors? Only time will tell. Thank you, I’ll be here all week! Try the veal!] Fidelity Investments® announced today a first-of-its kind financial app for Apple Watch. Through a unique design and experience, the Fidelity Mobile® app for Apple Watch conveniently gives customers a distinctive overview of global markets and alerts on stocks and investments in real-time right on their wrist.
[And finishing up this week’s broadcast is a recent post from Michael Kitces on his Nerd’s Eye View blog about learning to delegate work to others. I’m sure you’re heard time and time again that you need to delegate work to be more efficient with your own time, but some things are just easier if you do them yourself instead of showing someone else how to get the job done. So what was the breakthrough for Kitces? The answer was screencasting software.
Screencasting software allows you to record your computer screen and also record your narration of what you’re doing. When you’re finished, you can share your screencast video with colleagues or even with clients by uploading it as a private video online.
I make screencasts for my own business, and I even use them for graphics for Bits and Bytes broadcasts. The tool I prefer is Camtasia for Mac, they also have a version for Windows, and if you keep an eye out, you’ll often find a coupon code for 50% off.] For me, the “breakthrough” in how to delegate effectively came from using screencasting software – tools that record what’s happening on your computer screen, paired with the audio of you talking while you’re sitting in front of it.
Here are links to stories that didn’t make this week’s broadcast:
During the previous 12 months, Tamarac has added approximately 150 RIA firms to its roster of clients, bringing the total to more than 800 firms managing client assets in excess of $500 billion. The dramatic increase in RIA clients has had an exponential effect on the number of financial accounts residing on the Advisor Xi platform, which now number more than 1 million.
On today’s broadcast, Schwab and Google drop hints about their online investment services. See how this crowded market is about to become a little bit more cozy. Digital estate planning for your clients is becoming more important than ever. Find out which new solution will help your clients plan for their digital assets. And, Bob Veres gets me fired up about the use of social media in your business. You’ve been warned, prepare for a storm off!
Today’s episode is brought to you by Envestnet | Tamarac, the provider of Tamarac Advisor Xi, a web-based portfolio and client management platform that uniquely integrates portfolio management, reporting, monitoring, rebalancing, and trading with a client portal and enterprise level CRM.
Find out more about Advisor Xi and download their latest white paper on best practices for technology evaluation and implementation by visiting fppad.com/tamarac
[This week’s top story covers *two more* announcements in the online investment algorithm space. You did watch last week’s episode, didn’t you? So first up is Charles Schwab who, according to a Reuters article, is developing its own automated investing service for use by you, the financial advisor, to attract emerging clients with a low-cost solution. How low cost you ask? Rumors indicate the service will be free, not including the four to 19 basis points charged by Schwab’s ETFs used in the platform.
And on the heels of Schwab’s news, Google hinted that the company is exploring its own entry into the investment management business. Financial Times first reported that Google commissioned a research report back in September on entering the asset management industry, which trigged a wave of industry speculation that gained a lot of momentum this week.
So let’s take a step back for a moment. Schwab has over 7 million investor accounts with over $1trillion in assets under management and Google has over one billion users across their various online services and mobile devices.
Collectively, the online investment providers have somewhere around $3 billion in assets under management (that’s 3 tenths of a percent of Schwab!) and less than 100,000 users (that’s one one-hundredth of a percent of Google!). Are the disruptors about to be disrupted? I don’t know, you tell me, and it all depends on whom you ask.] Charles Schwab Corp. is weeks away from introducing an automated investing service aimed at winning business from novice investors it does not currently serve, company officials told Reuters.
[Next up is an announcement of a new service called Estate Assist, an online safe deposit box, if you will, that stores information about digital assets and shares that information with trusted recipients after a user passes away.
Identifying and managing your clients’ digital assets is probably not a part of your current service model, partly because there really haven’t been any decent solutions out there you can use that are better than using plain old spreadsheets. But with the introduction of Estate Assist, I think it’s time you consider including digital asset management services. Look at my YouTube channel or my email newsletter as an example: if I got hit by a bus <pause>, how will my spouse and beneficiaries access these assets?
In addition to Estate Assist, I think you should look into similar services from PrincipledHeart.com, created by CFP® practitioner William Bisset, as well the data inheritance feature from SecureSafe.] Estate Assist, launches out of beta today. Its aim is to help you store all your online passwords, social media accounts, digital health records, bank info and other paperwork.
[And finally, this week’s episode wraps up with industry commentary from Bob Veres, as he identifies the biggest ways your business needs to change in a recent Advisor Perspectives column. Now Veres says “pundits and journalists” say you need to make radical transformations, but they don’t give you any specifics. I hope he’s not talking about me, because I try to load these broadcasts you’re watching with tons of resources you should have on your radar. But I digress.
Veres mentions a number of what he calls “genuine evolutionary trends” which are all enlightening in their own way, but buried down at the bottom of his column, he says he suspects that “social media is going to be the least productive in terms of generating business for your firm.”
Really? Now to his credit, Veres says you should play to your strengths, and if social media isn’t one of them, it’s ok.
Well, I think that attitude was valid 20 years ago before it was possible to find out just about anything about anyone online using a quick Google search.
Just look at this broadcast. Complete strangers are watching it, they’re getting consistent value from it, and if they meet me in person at a conference, they say they feel like they already know me. So to say it’s the “least productive” way to generate business.. that’s it, I’m done.] Pundits and journalists make their living telling you that our profession is in a period of rapid evolutionary transition, and exhort you to be open to radical transformation. What you don’t hear in these messages are the specifics.
Here are the stories that didn’t make this week’s broadcast:
Refresh, the mobile tool for making you smarter at meetings, is now positioning itself to help sales teams be smarter about their clients and potential clients. To do that, the company has created a new product for Salesforce’s AppExchange that will allow users to access detailed information about the people in their professional network.
Today is the final day of FPA Retreat 2011, and Bill will soon be flying to Baltimore for a short weekend visit before returning to Dallas next Monday. As the events at Retreat unfolded, we’ve taken brief breaks to cover the best of technology news for advisers this week.
This InvestmentNews update covers a new Quickbooks integration in eFileCabinet Inc., a free social media policy resource, and news of the partnership between Trust Company of America and Black Diamond Performance Reporting.
TradeWarrior and TradePMR announced today an integration between the two firms. The partnership provides TradePMR advisors with the ability to seamlessly export their client data files into TradeWarrior’s powerful rebalancing and trading system. The affiliation marks the first time TradePMR has made rebalancing software available to their advisors.
The major custodians are taking a leaf from the page of the independent broker-dealers who, in the best of cases, look beyond their advisors’ need for trade execution to the entire area of practice management.
But even while confidence has slowly crept back among advisors, as the market has cooperated as well, many are still holding tight to the lessons of the past few years — spending on technology, but with a new kind of financial savvy and discretion.
Financial planners have benefited tremendously from new technologies introduced in the digital age by being able to conduct much of their business while on the go. However, one area of the digital movement that financial planners have been slow to adopt is document management technology.
At the Tiburon CEO Summit, Stuart DePina, CEO of software provider, Tamarac Corp., discusses what firms need to do with technology to service clients more effectively.
