SkyView Launches Marketplace to Buy, Sell Advisory Practices: Portfolio Products

SkyView Partners launched the Advisory Practice Board of Exchange, a subscription-free turnkey solution for buying and selling wealth management practices.

The new online marketplace has several features designed to attract prospective buyers, including clear seller search results, site participation anonymity maintained by only allowing verified sellers to view buyer profiles, and a platform to compete for seller listings, according to the Wayzata, Minnesota-based correspondent lender.

To promote anonymity and productivity for sellers, APBOE requires that an M&A consultant is used for sell-side representation, the company said.

“From independent to registered investment advisors, APBOE is a platform for serious buyers and sellers looking to conduct M&A transactions and access bank financing,” according to Scott Wetzel, SkyView CEO. “Currently, we have approximately two buyers per every seller on APBOE,” he said in a statement.

Initial APBOE market participants include M&A consultants Echelon Partners, DeVoe & Co., Smart Concepts Group and Advisor Legacy, who are providing consulting services to support buyers and sellers, SkyView said.

Fidelity Enhances Automated Managed Platform

Fidelity Clearing & Custody Solutions added customized investment models to its Automated Managed Platform, which combines digital advice capabilities with human advice and goals-based financial planning.

With the new addition, advisors using Fidelity’s AMP can customize investment models that Fidelity is starting to roll out to a limited number of firms. Advisors will be able to create models based on end-investors’ risk tolerance and define asset allocations using a variety of funds from across the industry, Fidelity said.

State Street Introduces Direct Access Lending

State Street introduced Direct Access Lending, a securities finance product that enables direct, principal loans between its lending and borrowing clients.

The new managed peer-to-peer product will “leverage the size and strength of State Street’s Agency Lending and Enhanced Custody programs, and underscores a continued focus on aligning solutions and technology across State Street to help clients achieve their objectives,” it said.

Money in Motion Analytics Added to Pershing

BNY Mellon’s Pershing subsidiary has made Money in Motion analytics available to clients. The new digital solution enables financial professionals to measure organic growth by isolating the effects of market performance on their business.

The tool is one of several strategic initiatives announced at Pershing’s June Insite conference to help clients accelerate the digitization of business processes and is free of charge to clients on the NetX360 platform. It allows financial professionals to track net new asset flows, set growth benchmarks and measure progress against those benchmarks, “giving them control over the future of their business,” the company said.

Money in Motion tracks transactions related to checks, Automated Clearing House, wires, disbursements, rollovers, fees, Automated Customer Account Transfer Services transfers, non-ACAT transfers and tax withholding.

It can also break down net new asset flows in various ways, including by account or investment type, as well as by financial professional and geographical location, and offers historical data going back to Jan. 1, 2017. Financial professionals using the tool can also set their own net new assets criteria to focus on factors that matter most to their business,

Barclays Bank Launches No-Fee ETNs

Barclays Bank launched no-fee exchange-traded notes: iPath Gold ETN (GBUG) iPath Silver ETN (SBUG), both trading on the NYSE Arca exchange.

The ETNs are its first no-fee exchange-traded products (ETPs) offering exposure to precious metals, the company said.

The iPath Gold ETN tracks the Barclays Gold 3-Month Index Total Return (BCC2GC3T), while the iPath Silver ETN track the Barclays Silver 3-Month Index Total Return (BCC2SI3T). Each index was designed to reflect: (1) the performance of specified gold or silver futures contracts, respectively, that will become the first liquid nearby futures contracts three months in the future in accordance with a specified schedule and (2) the return that corresponds to the weekly announced interest rate for specified 3-month U.S. Treasury bills, the company said.

OpenInvest Offers Personalized ESG Portfolios to BancWest

Separately managed account asset manager OpenInvest is now offering financial advisors at Bank of the West’s BancWest Investment Services access to customizable values-based portfolio generation tools.

OpenInvest’s technology will allow BancWest to generate customized investment portfolios tailored to each client’s values “at a granular level,” the companies said. Offering a prediction, Joshua Levin, OpenInvest chief strategy officer and its co-founder, said “mass customization is the future of wealth management.”

The OpenInvest platform integrates multi-sourced environmental, social and governance data that “consistently updates to stay best-in-class,” it said.

Scientific Beta, J.P. Morgan Launch New Portfolio Solutions

Scientific Beta and J.P. Morgan teamed up to provide a new set of solutions they said are designed for institutional investors to access single factor indices.

The new solutions combine Scientific Beta’s analytical expertise in the area of single-factor equity solutions in the context of completeness portfolios with J.P. Morgan’s index structuring capabilities that offer clients flexible ways to access improved implementation of the portfolio completeness approach, the companies said.

“With the growing popularity of equity smart beta solutions it has become crucial for institutional investors to be able to properly measure factor exposure and diversification at the overall portfolio level,” according to the companies.

Taylor Frigon Offerings Added to Envestnet’s Platform

Taylor Frigon Capital Management’s Core Growth Fund and Core Growth Strategy were added to Envestnet’s model unified managed account platform.

The addition was “part of our ongoing broader effort to meet investor demand,” according to Gerry Frigon, president and chief investment officer of San Luis Obispo, California-based RIA Taylor Frigon.

GraniteShares Adds U.S. Large Cap ETF

Exchange-traded fund specialist GraniteShares added the XOUT U.S. Large Cap ETF (XOUT) to its offerings.

The new ETF has a net expense ratio of 0.60%, trades on the NYSE Arca exchange and tracks the XOUT U.S. Large Cap Index.

With the ETF, GraniteShares “aims to exclude U.S. large cap companies most likely to suffer from technological disruption over the long term,” it said. The company is out to “take advantage of” what it called passive investing’s “biggest flaw – buying every company in an index, even those in long-term secular decline.”

Pentegra, ADP Team Up for Retirement Solution

White Plains, New York-based retirement plan provider Pentegra joined forces with ADP Retirement Services to offer 3(16) fiduciary solutions to complement ADP’s retirement recordkeeping services.

The new solution will assist businesses of all sizes “reduce administrative responsibilities, simplify retirement plan complexities and minimize risk,” the companies said. It will also provide ADP 401(k) clients with the ability to outsource key retirement plan administrative duties, they said.

Pentegra will also provide an interactive tool, Retirement GuidePath, for advisors to engage with plan sponsors, “later this fall,” it said. The tool was designed by Blue Rush, a provider of interactive and personalized video solutions, and presents a customized, personal video experience for each client, using a video-based platform that Pentegra said “simplifies complex terminology and ensures immediate relevancy to drive better engagement across the customer journey.”

Broadridge Starts Incorporating Sisense Analytics

Broadridge Financial Solutions started incorporating Sisense’s embedded data analytics into the Broadridge revenue and expense management application.

With Sisense’s analytics, Broadridge’s sell- and buy-side clients will gain the benefit of “enhanced data analytics, operational workflow efficiencies and transparency, helping them to gain instant insights into revenue and expense streams and achieve an advanced level of reporting,” Broadridge said.

The embedded Sisense functionality provides clients with “greater access to data-driven insights, dashboarding and seamless reporting, without the cost or disruption involved with building or buying a data warehouse,” according to Broadridge.

The enhancement is “one of the latest innovations in our continued strategy to meet the evolving needs of our clients and help them be ready for what’s next,” according to Eric Bernstein, Broadridge’s head of Asset Management Solutions.

Timbrel Capital Launches

Timbrel Capital, based in Atlanta, is offering various services to financial advisors that it says are designed to drive “expanded growth opportunities for alternative product sponsors … bringing high-quality, innovative investment solutions to the marketplace” via broker-dealers and RIAs.

Timbrel Capital is led by President Jean Merriman and was started by SFA Holdings, the parent company of The Strategic Financial Alliance, an independent BD and corporate RIA. Other members of the new division’s team include managing directors Zach Adams, Brannon McPherson and Amanda Teeple.

Virtus Introduces New Small-Mid Cap Fund

Virtus Investment Partners launched the Virtus KAR International Small-Mid Cap Fund, managed by Kayne Anderson Rudnick Investment Management.

The new fund includes A shares (VKIAX with a net expense ratio of 1.45%), C shares (VKICX at 2.20%), I shares (VKIIX at 1.20%) and R6 shares (VKIRX at 1.10%). The fund is benchmarked to the MSCI All Country World ex U.S. SMID Cap Index and is designed to be a concentrated portfolio of about 30-60 holdings.

The fund offers investors exposure to non-U.S small- and mid-cap companies that “possess enduring competitive advantages and control over their markets,” the companies said. Managers Craig Thrasher and Hyung Kim focus on companies with attractive valuations that they believe have low business risk, as identified by consistent and profitable growth, high returns on capital and a low organic need for external financing.

— Check out last week’s portfolio product roundup here: Vanguard Expands Active Offerings: Portfolio Products.

Portfolio Construction

SkyView Launches Marketplace to Buy, Sell Advisory Practices: Portfolio Products

Fidelity Enhances Automated Managed Platform

State Street Introduces Direct Access Lending