Pershing X Teams With Startup to Boost Financial Planning Efficiency: Tech Roundup  

BNY Mellon’s Pershing X division teamed with technology startup Conquest Planning to integrate Conquest’s financial planning application into the Pershing X platform, the companies said Thursday.

Advisors using the Pershing X platform will benefit from a personalized experience provided through a combination of artificial intelligence, analytics and real-time client collaboration, the companies said.

The Conquest solution will go live on the Pershing X platform in 2023.

BNY Mellon also said it made an unspecified equity investment in Conquest, “reinforcing our commitment to client servicing and innovation.”

Dynasty Partners With Allocate

As part of a pact with digital platform Allocate, Dynasty Financial Partners network of RIAs will gain the ability to invest in venture capital funds on behalf of their clients, the companies said in a joint announcement Wednesday.

Allocate provides investors with a “streamlined” method to access venture funds and co-investments, the companies said.

“Dynasty believes that the venture firms get their pick of high-quality deals, partner with their choice of founders, and help these founders work to build successful businesses,” Carter Reum, co-founder of venture firm M13 and an Allocate investor, said in a statement.

“Unfortunately, access has been limited at best for other non-institutional accredited investors,” he noted. “We believe the venture market is overdue for innovation,” he said, predicting the Dynasty-Allocate partnership will “widen access to venture managers, while also lessening the administrative burden for those venture GPs attracting capital.”

Envestnet Launches Advisor Assessment

Envestnet teamed with financial services research and advisory firm Aite-Novarica Group to launch what Envestnet called the “industry’s first financial advisor assessment,” the Intelligent Financial Life Advisor Practice Score.

The assessment evaluates to what degree an advisor is helping clients “achieve peace of mind and financial security regarding their ability to meet all their financial needs and goals,” Envestnet said Tuesday.

The assessment yields insights into how an advisor can deliver even greater value and achieve higher levels of client satisfaction to help grow practices.

For advisors, there is a large correlation between achieving a top Advisor Practice Score and managing more client assets, according to Envestnet. Advisors with a score of 80 or higher manage $443 million in client assets on average, representing 69% more assets than their counterparts who scored in the bottom quartile of the survey, Envestnet said.

The assessment grew out of an online study conducted by Aite-Novarica on behalf of Envestnet in late 2021 that polled 483 advisors to examine how advisors are helping their clients achieve a concept Envestnet developed called “The Intelligent Financial Life.”

Flourish Integrates With Tamarac

Flourish Crypto, a turnkey, direct-ownership cryptocurrency investing solution offered by financial product platform Flourish, announced the launch of its integration with Envestnet | Tamarac.

Flourish Crypto and Envestnet | Tamarac built a direct, custodial integration, allowing RIAs to incorporate Flourish Crypto data into their reporting just like any other asset — from performance to billing — in a simple and secure way, Flourish said Tuesday,

Advisors can leverage Envestnet | Tamarac to manage client portfolios, support reporting and planning, implement billing and more.

Including cryptocurrency data within existing reporting systems is “critical for RIA adoption of this emergent asset class,” according to Flourish.

A recent survey of high-net-worth investors found 91% of those younger than 40 had investments in digital assets, according to Ben Cruikshank, Flourish president.

“Flourish Crypto data flows into Envestnet | Tamarac through a direct custodial integration, allowing RIAs to incorporate cryptocurrency investing into their practice much like any other asset,” Flourish said.

The Flourish platform is used by over 440 wealth management firms representing more than $1.4 trillion in assets under management, it said.

FA Match Rolls Out ‘Test Drive’ for Advisors

FA Match, a provider of recruiting technology services for financial advisors and firms, launched Advisor Test Drive, accessible through FA Match’s website.

Advisor Test Drive was designed to “democratize advisor access to high-quality, vetted career opportunities,” the company said Wednesday.

Using the platform’s Advisor Match AI technology, any advisor can search and filter through career opportunities across the more than 500 financial firms in the FA Match ecosystem, with no login, signup, fee or commitment required, it said.

SMArtX Adds New Strategies

SMArtX Advisory Solutions, which specializes in unified managed accounts technology and developed the SMArtX turnkey asset management platform, said Wednesday that it added six new investment and asset management firms to its platform.

The six new asset management firms are Asteria Wealth, Astoria Portfolio Advisors, Financial Trust Asset Management, John Hancock Investment Management, Nuveen Asset Management and Pimco.

New strategies were also launched on the platform by existing firms Argent Capital Management, Crossmark Global Investments, J.P. Morgan Asset Management and Lazard Asset Management.

The SMArtX platform now supports 1,100 model-traded and manager-traded separate account strategies from 273 asset managers, enabling advisors to tailor their client portfolios to their individual investment needs and macro trends, it said.

iCapital Partners With Ardian

iCapital teamed with private investment firm Ardian to provide wealth managers with access to Ardian’s private market investment strategies.

Products from iCapital created as a result of the partnership will be available via Allfunds, a B2B wealthtech platform.

Ardian will also leverage iCapital’s technology platform and structuring solutions to offer wealth managers and their clients access to Ardian’s private markets expertise, the companies said Tuesday.

RedBlack Gains New RIA Support

On Tuesday, intelliflo announced that RIA Obermeyer Wood Investment Counsel implemented RedBlack, its portfolio rebalancing and trading platform.

RedBlack will enable the RIA, with about $2 billion in assets under management, to trade client accounts with enhanced efficiency, freeing up “significant time for employees to focus on other strategic and client-focused initiatives,” intelliflo said.

ACA Adds Capabilities to ComplianceAlpha

Governance, risk and compliance advisor ACA Group added several new capabilities to ComplianceAlpha, its integrated regtech solutions platform, the company said Tuesday.

The latest additions are intended to “better support the surveillance of and adherence to policies related to electronic communications,” it said.

By offering electronic communication surveillance capabilities via the ACA ComplianceAlpha platform, financial services firms can now leverage in-built functions to seamlessly escalate issues to management, it said.

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