Here are the links to today’s top stories:
LearnVest to drop financial planning while ‘further integrating’ into Northwestern Mutual from Financial-Planning.com
Financial Engines Announces Agreement to Be Acquired by Hellman & Friedman for $45.00 Per Share in Cash from Businesswire.com
Alexa can remember birthdays and other things for you now from TechCrunch.com
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Learnvest to Shut Down Accounts by June 5
One of the larger acquisitions among financial planning startups in recent years is closing out with a whimper, as Learnvest told its customers that it will be shutting down its online investment tools next month, according to an email sent by the company and highlighted by Financial Planning Magazine. Back in 2015, Learnvest received substantial fanfare as Northwestern Mutual announced the acquisition of the online financial planning startup, and while terms of the deal were not disclosed, it was widely reported that the deal’s valuation was somewhere around $250 million.
Now three years later, Learnvest said it will turn off access to customer accounts on June 5 and plans to relaunch later this year as a “digital resource focused on educating consumers on how to meet their financial goals” according to a company statement. Some 8,000 customers will be affected, and may turn to other low-cost online financial planning services available from members of groups like the XY Planning Network or Garrett Planning Network.
Financial Engines to be Acquired for $3 Billion
In other acquisition news, Financial Engines, the nation’s largest independent investment adviser, announced it has agreed to be acquired by private equity firm Hellman & Friedman in an all-cash transaction valued at just over $3 billion. The transaction will merge Financial Engines’ $169 billion in assets with $21 billion in assets from Edelman Financial Services, which is another company in the Hellman & Friedman portfolio.
According to the Financial Engines statement, the combined companies will create the leading provider of scalable, comprehensive, and unbiased advice for all investors.
Alexa Adds “Remember This” Skill
And finally, did you forget your mother’s birthday or the last time you changed the filters in your HVAC? Well now there’s a skill for that, as Amazon rolled out a new skill for Alexa called “Remember This.” Simply ask Alexa to remember just about anything, including important dates, names, clothing sizes, you name it, and Alexa will remember the information and repeat it back to you when you ask in the future. I think this is a very slick feature, as you’re essentially building your own personal database of reference information that you can recall anytime in the future, all without any programming or writing a single line of code. You can’t do that with SQL!
For all the links to today’s top stories, be sure to visit FPPad.com/flashbriefing.
I’m Bill Winterberg, and those are your fintech headlines for today from FPPad.com. Check back in with me later for more fintech news.
