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Welcome to the Could 2023 subject of the Newest Information in Monetary #AdvisorTech – the place we take a look at the large information, bulletins, and underlying developments and developments which can be rising on this planet of expertise options for monetary advisors!
This month’s version kicks off with the information that robo-advisor Betterment entered right into a $9M settlement with the SEC for misrepresenting its tax-loss harvesting practices in its consumer agreements and advertising supplies in contrast with its precise practices (e.g., ‘solely’ checking consumer portfolios for tax-loss harvesting each different day, after having marketed day by day checks) – a primary for the SEC in scrutinizing an RIA not for failing to execute its funding guarantees to shoppers, however for failing to execute tax-loss harvesting guarantees as an alternative. Which can increase questions for different RIAs (together with smaller corporations) who promote their tax-loss harvesting practices as a part of a ‘tax-efficient’ investing technique about whether or not their very own practices (and the expertise they use to implement it) actually align with what they declare to supply.
From there, the most recent highlights additionally characteristic a variety of different attention-grabbing advisor expertise bulletins, together with:
- Altruist has introduced a $112 million Sequence D fundraising spherical to increase its capabilities to fulfill the wants of bigger advisory corporations, the most recent in a sequence of high-profile strikes (together with turning into a completely self-clearing broker-dealer and buying its rival custodian SSG) positioning Altruist to compete instantly with the likes of Schwab and Constancy for established RIAs.
- GeoWealth has acquired its fellow TAMP First Ascent Asset Administration, marrying GeoWealth’s tech-forward, open-architecture funding administration platform with First Ascent’s ‘concierge’-style funding and service-oriented resolution (and its flat-fee TAMP enterprise mannequin).
- T. Rowe Value has acquired Retiree Revenue, the father or mother firm of widespread retirement earnings planning software program SSAnalyzer and Revenue Solver, to place its sources behind growing and distributing the corporate’s planning instruments (albeit maybe extra to its retail and worker retirement plan shoppers than to advisors?).
Learn the evaluation about these bulletins on this month’s column, and a dialogue of extra developments in advisor expertise, together with:
- Enterprise help software program supplier Benjamin shuts down its operations, which can say much less concerning the demand for workflow help instruments (which seems to stay sturdy) and extra about Benjamin’s positioning itself as an “AI-driven digital assistant” in an atmosphere the place advisors could not belief AI expertise sufficient to pay for it as an answer.
- A glance again on the evolution of advisor expertise as we come up on the 5-year anniversary of our Monetary AdvisorTech Options Map, which displays not solely the more and more crowded panorama with a proliferating variety of options available on the market, but in addition how shifting expertise wants of advisors themselves are eliminating entire classes of advisor expertise… and spawning new ones as effectively.
And be sure to learn to the top, the place we’ve got supplied an replace to our widespread “Monetary AdvisorTech Options Map” (and likewise added the adjustments to our AdvisorTech Listing) as effectively!
*And for #AdvisorTech firms who need to submit their tech bulletins for consideration in future points, please undergo TechNews@kitces.com!
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