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RIABiz

Articles published 12/2017


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The RIA conscience knows no past or future but plenty of sparks.

The top 10 most-read RIABiz articles of 2017 told stories about what RIAs, brokers, vendors can get away with post-DOL rule

Change is abrupt, pain is severe but most of it can be traced to custodians and advisors taking their medicine preemptively

December 28, 2017 at 8:49 PM

Don Trone: You've seen the old-school testing with the wires out of the head, but today it's wireless and it looks like a swim cap and you don't even need the goop to keep it on.

Claiming DOL rule has no handle on truth, Don Trone crafts lie detector test to assess RIA brains

The Neuro-Fiduciary & Governance Psychometric Instrument involves an EEG, an interview and six colleagues willing to vouch for your true fiduciary bona fides

December 24, 2017 at 5:23 AM

David Canter: It's not precipitous. It's sort of this slow-melting ice cube.

Fidelity sounds alarm over RIA discounting but Mark Tibergien, Eric Clarke and others see it differently

Pershing's Gabe Garcia sees more RIAs raising fees than lowering them but Fidelity's David Canter says he observes real-life discounts that support survey results

December 21, 2017 at 5:05 PM

Neal Simon: The system is broken.

Fed up owner of $5.4 billion RIA prepares to run for U.S. Senate as independent

Neal Simon, CEO of Bronfman Rothschild and advocate of The Centrist Project, has exploratory committee in place and will decide by February

December 20, 2017 at 10:13 PM




Don Phillips: The Journal's article adopts the free-drink mindset, only in reverse.

How Morningstar got in the last word after The Wall Street Journal dropped a year-in-the-making investigative piece on the fund tracker's head

Don Phillips used Chicago street talk and wielded research muscle to hit the Dow Jones newspaper high and low

December 19, 2017 at 8:12 PM


Louis Harvey: One of the big things that RIAs had from day one was they could say they always put clients' interests first and now that argument is pretty much shot to hell.

How Merrill Lynch 'shot to hell' the RIA fiduciary citadel by casting its $7.5 billion fiduciary 401(k) unit as smaller, purer and more future-minded on paper

Despite FAS having fewer 401(k) assets than, for example, a single North Carolina-based RIA, CAPTRUST, the Charlotte-based Bank of America's brokerage unit has created a new competitive threat

December 16, 2017 at 12:20 AM

Brent Brodeski: We are being deemed 'have-nots' for being in the professional services and financial services businesses.

Why Brent Brodeski, a $6-billion GOP RIA, is in a furious full-time fight against the Republican RIA-unfriendly tax bill

The Rockford, Ill.-based owner of $6-billion Savant Capital makes appeals to Paul Ryan, Ron Johnson and other GOP higher-ups after LLC income gets short shrift

December 14, 2017 at 12:44 AM

Warren Pennington:  Investment managers will be able to instantly distribute, receive and process index data, resulting in better benchmark tracking and significant cost savings.

Vanguard Group makes $1.15-trillion AUM bet on blockchain technology that eliminates giant daily manual process

The $4.8-trillion giant applies the 'bitcoin' decentralized ledger to CRSP-tracked AUM to match indexes and index funds in real time

December 13, 2017 at 1:09 AM



Shirl Penney (2nd from r., flanked by Rich Gill, Marty Bicknell and John Furey): ​Breakaways should expect to 'pay a 25% settlement fee moving forward.'

An RIABiz advertising exec derives hard meanings from soft comments made by big shots at MarketCounsel Summit

Post-TD Tom Bradley, post-refinanced Elliot Weissbluth, post-divorce David Bach and Ric Edelman, post-protocol Shirl Penney and post-windfall Marty Bicknell were among execs who tipped their hands and hearts about where they are headed

December 12, 2017 at 2:18 PM

Sallie Krawcheck: He proceeded to give me chapter and verse on how financial advisors are hard to manage. (Photo credit: WBUR)

Robo-advisors hit lull in everything but VC backing as reality fragments their identity

A Silicon Valley venture capitalist lectures Sallie Krawcheck on drawbacks of human advisors after she explains she needs capital to hire some

December 11, 2017 at 9:43 PM

Jud Bergman's Envestnet has seen a spectacular rebound in its share price since early 2016.

Publicly traded 'RIA' stocks are having a banner 2017

Wall Street is loving shares of Schwab, Envestnet, Morningstar and LPL

December 8, 2017 at 12:28 AM

Gary Zimmerman:  My wife was worried about whether I'd lose my job, but I wasn't worried. I was worried about all of our cash.

Citi exec 'accidentally' invents cash-robo with 400 RIAs as distribution channel

Gary Zimmerman scrambled in 2009 from Tokyo to shield millions in uninsured cash, leading to MaxMyInterest, which RIAs now use to automate process of getting $5 million under FDIC protection -- and often earning an extra 100 basis points in the bargain

December 7, 2017 at 8:00 PM

Larry Raffone: At the very biggest Fidelity plans, they very much value the things that we offer.

Fidelity Investments (explicitly) enters 401(k) advice game -- then Financial Engines' shares plummet despite its 'Mutual Fund Store' RIA winning Boeing and Ford accounts

The Boston giant now offers non-discretionary advice to non-recordkeeping customers and Financial Engines cuts its prices, bleeding out Wall Street's belief in the firm

December 6, 2017 at 6:16 PM

Greg Fleming: I love the Rockefeller name and brand and family. I'm fixated on it.

How Greg Fleming got props from his 90-year-old uncle by ankling the wirehouses after 25 years and joining a 'small' family concern

From his perch atop Rockefeller Capital Management, the Ex-Morgan Stanley and Merrill exec derives lessons for profitably serving the 'Vanguard set'

December 6, 2017 at 5:38 PM

Brooke Southall: An advisor joining a smaller business unit is suddenly in a crucible where his or her integrity is exposed for all to see.

What seven attributes define RIA integrity and why -- unlike standalone 'fiduciary care' -- Wall Street finds it radioactive

Doing the 'right thing' by investors leaves plenty of room for Wall Street to play its patented game of blurring the edges, warns editor-in-chief Brooke Southall responding to RIABiz readers who disagreed with his earlier op-ed

December 5, 2017 at 6:45 PM


Natalie Zahradnik: RIAs in particular can be early adopters of new products.

PIMCO's institutionalize-Bill-Gross effort culminates after three years in price hikes tempered by ETF migraines and fee cuts

The Newport Beach, Calif.-based manager notably jacks up charge for PIMCO Income Fund after it soars to $92 billion, which slowed its asset flows not at all as it zoomed past $100 billion

December 4, 2017 at 8:31 PM

RIAs can move to the green pastures of 'integrity' to get past the muddy trenches of harmonizing a definition of 'fiduciary.'

It's time for RIAs to shift the 'fiduciary' debate and make it about 'integrity'

Integrity demands wholeness, which Wall Street can't claim as its sales staff and business model continues to get thrashed in the marketplace

December 1, 2017 at 2:19 AM

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