Perfect environment for SMA growth: BlackRock
Several factors are combining that will rapidly escalate the use of separately managed accounts (SMAs), according to BlackRock’s co-head of customised portfolio service, James Langlands.
Langlands advised that heightened volatility and closure of some funds in the past two years has changed the attitudes of both advisers and investors.
“Future of financial advice reforms will prompt advisers and investors to look for lower cost solutions to either direct individual portfolios or wraps of managed funds,” Langlands said.
According to the recently published research by Investment Trends, advisers are placing more clients in direct shares. The research house expects this trend to increase, suggesting new client investment in direct shares will rise from 14 per cent in 2009 to 26 per cent in 2013.
Langland added SMAs help avoid the issues that advisers encounter when advising on direct share investments, such as compliance risks and work involved in monitoring stocks.
Recommended for you
Digital advice tools are on the rise, but licensees will need to ensure they still meet adviser obligations or potentially risk a class action if clients lose money from a rogue algorithm.
Shaw and Partners has merged with Sydney wealth manager Kennedy Partners Wealth, while Ord Minnett has hired a private wealth adviser from Morgan Stanley.
Australian investors are more confident than their APAC peers in reaching their financial goals and are targeting annual gains of more than 10 per cent, according to Fidelity International.
Zenith Investment Partners has lost its head of portfolio solutions Steven Tang after 17 years with the firm, the latest in a series of senior exits from the research house.
