Placemark Awarded U.S. Patent for Tax Management System

Placemark Investments on Monday, May 17, received a patent for a process that uses the firm’s overlay management technology to let advisors manage taxes by limiting gains and making other trade-offs tailored to a client’s specific tax considerations.

Awarded by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the patent, originally filed in 2001, is based on Placemark’s overlay management technology, which combines multiple account portfolios into a single custodial account. Placemark’s tax-specific approach balances risk, opportunity, and tax costs for each trade, and the tax cost for each trade is calculated based on client-specific rates, realized gains, and losses within a portfolio.

Placemark has already launched dozens of these proprietary managed account programs for clients such as Oppenheimer, Prudential Investments, Hilliard Lyons, and Janney Montgomery Scott as well as independent registered investment advisory firms.