Presented by Morningstar ByAllAccounts
Wealthtech, or fintech that powers wealth management, is disrupting the financial management industry. In this VB Spotlight, you’ll hear about the top five wealth technology trends now, including how data automation is impacting the industry, new innovative opportunities, and more.
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Wealthtech is where today’s technology and wealth management meet – it’s a sophisticated fintech that uses data not only to improve investor outcomes, but also to help advisors get a bigger share of the portfolio and deliver experiences compelling and deeply integrated for all stakeholders, including consultants and back-office staff.
“There has been an explosion of innovation driven by emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning, as well as the democratization of investing, which has made it easier for retail investors to learn and participate in the market,” he said Don McHenry, senior product manager, Morningstar ByAllAccounts. “Combined, all of these factors have driven wealth management to scale these technologies and deliver more compelling and comprehensive products and services to their clients.”
He was joined by Reed Colley, CEO and co-founder of Summit Wealth, a modern wealth management platform, to talk about how wealth technology is impacting the industry, top five trends to watch, and how to stay competitive in an increasingly crowded market.
“It’s this ecosystem of platforms, applications and features that have all been driven by an increased need to troubleshoot within an asset management firm, both for the advisors themselves internally and often for clients,” said Colley. “What consultants care most about is driving a solution for their clients that allows them to truly help. A lot of it starts with the data coming out of something like ByAllAccounts. Bringing this data together is the key to building the technology stack and a foundation for all of these wealth technologies.”
Why investing in wealthtech is essential
Investors today have greater access to investment information than ever before and can manage their own portfolios, which means that when an investor engages with an advisor, they are being asked to provide a high-quality digital experience by their advisors.
“The baseline for digital experience as investors is set by Netflix and Amazon. These companies are setting consumer expectations which are then applied to the advisory relationship,” said McHenry. “This expectation is coupled with the fact that some $60 trillion is about to be transferred from the older generation and boomers to the younger generation over the next decade or so. As a result, it is important for wealth management firms to quickly adapt and adopt these technologies to serve these markets or fall behind.”
Not to mention wealthtech helping wealth management firms make their practice more efficient and reduce costs by automating previously manual tasks.
“The bigger question is how can we help them with holistic wealth management that they can use to the benefit of their clients,” Colley said. “Creating a customer experience that is meaningful to what is happening in their lives.”
Humanize wealth management
Today’s technology—from cloud infrastructure to serverless and real APIs to microservices—enables more efficient data flow that didn’t even exist five years ago. Data security has been infinitely improved by moving away from multi-tenant models, and modern languages and libraries promote an unprecedented customer experience, linking their richness to their values.
“People are less interested in the shift from active to passive management that has occurred over the last 10-20 years; less concerned with detailed returns,” Colley said. be in your life. Not just focused on, can I drive investment performance? That’s the stake.
Anyone can track an index, he added; today it’s about allocating goals and understanding the customer, then creating a system that feels very human and accurately personalized when they use it. Investors want intimacy, guided by empathic engagement, to address their needs with relevant solutions and knowing that an advisor tracks the client’s evolving needs and available options and offers help they may not even know they need.
“Customers don’t really want to know how much they spend on coffee each month,” she said. “They want to know: can I take this trip next year with the whole family for our 50th anniversary? If their advisor can help them get there with human tools in a scalable way, that’s what’s going to win in this space.
The challenges of wealthtech adoption
Growth and scalability are key to staying competitive, but this is often hampered by data challenges, too many moving parts in a platform, and lack of experience dealing with technical issues, as integrating technology is certainly not a core competency for a consultant.
“What we hear and see is that these technology stacks are fragmented, fragile and, in many cases, just plain broken at what they are supposed to do,” Colley explained. And then the tech debt starts piling up: It becomes increasingly complex, costly, and difficult to address issues, fix bugs, and even update systems, inhibiting your ability to scale internal operations and thereby potentially grow into new customer segments or new markets.
“They shouldn’t be afraid to outsource consulting or regular auditing of their technology stack, because they need to focus on their core competency, which is their customers and the relationships they have with their customers,” said McHenry. “As for larger firms, whether it’s a broker-dealer or a RIA consolidator, don’t stand in isolation. Don’t integrate new technologies into a vacuum. It is important to integrate horizontally”.
This means considering all the technologies they may be using in both the advisor and investor workflow and the use cases of both internal and external stakeholders. For larger companies, it is important to have the right resources in-house, with expertise in both the technologies and use cases within the organization.
“It’s not uncommon for larger businesses to have gaps here,” he added. “If so, they need to acknowledge it. They have to seek assistance or advice in finding the right resources because development is expensive. There is a very high switching cost whenever they make changes to their technology stack. And, of course, they want to offer their customers a unique and exceptional experience.”
In the end, it’s crucial to keep humans at the center of the equation.
“Investors have proven time and time again that the technology is great, but it’s the human interaction that can’t be matched,” said McHenry. “It’s being able to use these technologies and balance them with human interaction, ultimately focusing on the customer relationship.”
Don’t miss the entire conversation, available free upon request. You’ll delve into the top five asset technology trends in the wealth management industry and how to stay ahead of the curve, hear about emerging innovations, and get practical advice on how to harness the power of asset technology.
Agenda
- Top 5 Wealth Tech Trends for 2023
- Because you need high-quality use-case specific data to power these solutions and apps
- How tight integration of aggregate data and best-in-market data accelerates innovation
- And more!
Presenters
- Reed ColleyCEO and co-founder of Summit Wealth
- Don McHenrySenior Product Manager, Morningstar ByAllAccounts
- Greg MilesModerator, VentureBeat
