Fidelity announced plans for new technology tools coming to Wealthscape, its tech platform for registered investment advisors and broker/dealers, in the third quarter of 2018. With the new capabilities, advisors will be able to aggregate client data across accounts, create a more holistic picture of their finances, gain insights from that data to increase profitability and access an open architecture digital marketplace.
“2018 will be the year to turn data into insights—and that will be an advisor’s competitive differentiator,” said Tim Morello, vice president of product management, Fidelity Institutional. “Advisors have always known how important data is, but now through the Consolidated Data offering, they will be able to access and leverage data to help them efficiently make informed decisions about—and for—their clients.”
Fidelity began rolling out its Wealthscape tech stack in 2016, providing a uniform platform across the company’s business to access trading, client profiles or any other digital tool an advisor should need. It included an integration with eMoney Advisor to give more advisors the ability to offer financial planning. It also included a performance measurement tool as well as the automated managed platform, Fidelity AMP, the firm’s robo advisor co-developed with eMoney. More than 20 firms now use AMP.
The firm will pilot its Consolidated Data offering in the third quarter, in which Fidelity will aggregate data from such sources as Fidelity data, assets under administration, client-permissioned data, market data, customer relationship management data and firm-provided data. The data will then be normalized and streamlined across sources.
“Many of Fidelity’s broker/dealer, bank and RIA clients have either been developing their own data solutions or paying for data from outside vendors,” the firm said in a statement. “These solutions face potential obstacles, such as flawed reconciliation, a disjointed experience and costliness to maintain. Fidelity aimed to solve these problems, focusing on quality and reliability.”
Advisors will also be able to interpret that data and turn it into actionable insights for their business via the new Insights + Analytics tool, which also goes into pilot phase in the third quarter. The tool allows them to see a snapshot of their book, identify segments that need attention, assess clients at risk and determine client value.
It will use artificial intelligence, machine learning and predictive analytics to provide these insights. At the outset, it will draw from Fidelity-only data, but later on will include multi-custodial data and client CRM feeds.
“Advisors will be able to interpret insights and leverage their personal experiences and relationships to take action,” the firm said in a statement.
Other tech providers have also been focused on helping advisors get actionable insights out of their clients’ account data. Just today, account aggregation provider Quovo unveiled a new feature called Cue, an alerts engine designed to notify advisors about clients’ account activities, milestones or life events that may warrant a conversation.
Fidelity is also making its Integration Xchange available in the third quarter, which includes a digital store stocked with application programming interfaces, framing and linking capabilities and data feeds. Firms can also integrate with more than 100 third-party technology providers.
In the second quarter, the firm will add Advanced Modeling & Rebalancing to its portfolio tools, which provides household rebalancing, asset class rebalancing and tax-aware capabilities.
