Commonwealth Rolls Out New Financial Planning Tools With RightCapital

Advisors can show client goals in new ways that run "the full gamut of planning from simple to advanced,” according to one executive.

Darren Tedesco, managing principal, speaks at Commonwealth’s 2018 national event in Austin.

Commonwealth Financial Network has partnered with RightCapital to share more financial planning tools with its advisors.

The integration will let the broker-dealer and RIA’s roughly 1,800 independent advisors build financial plans for clients more efficiently, the two firms says. RightCapital’s technology has interactive planning features, such as tax-efficient retirement income withdrawal strategies, with Roth IRA conversions and a Medicare module.

“For the past decade, Commonwealth has integrated goal tracking right into Client360 [software], straddling the line between basic calculators and comprehensive financial planning software,” according to Darren Tedesco, managing principal of Innovation and Strategy at Commonwealth.

With the partnership, Commonwealth’s Client360 software now will show clients’ goals “in sync with RightCapital’s own software, allowing advisors to run the full gamut of planning from simple to advanced,” he explained.  

Commonwealth is based in Waltham, Massachusetts, while RightCapital has its main office in Shelton, Connecticut. The BD/RIA has a $250-per-month technology fee for performance reporting, CRM, goal tracking, document storage, proposal creation, rebalancing software and analytics.

For its part, the firm spends about $70 million a year on IT. To date, the has invested some $500 million into its technology platform and services.

From Nov. 7-10, Commonwealth hosted its yearly educational conference in Austin. Executives highlighted its growing RIA operations and other industry trends at the event.