Which platform has taken the top spot?

HUB24 has edged out Netwealth to take the top spot for overall platform functionality, according to the annual platform report from Investment Trends. 

The firm’s 2022 Platform Benchmarking and Competitive Analysis Report, now in its 19th year, saw HUB24 score 91.5%, followed by Netwealth at 90.7%. 

This was a reversal of last year’s results where Netwealth took the top spot with 91.5% and HUB24 had 91.1%.

In third place was Praemium (89.9%), BT Panorama (84.7%) and Mason Stevens at (83.3%).

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Investment Trends noted that Mason Stevens has posted the largest relative increase in score for the second consecutive year, rising from 82.6% last year, while BT Panorama declined slightly from 85.1% last year.

All platforms had made improvements on the number of models and managers for managed accounts, on tax optimisation tools and on environmental, social and governance (ESG) where platforms had introduced integrations with third-party ESG ratings tools.
 
“All platforms have particularly sharpened their focus on the investment menu,” said Paul McGivern, director at Investment Trends.

“Retirement income has been at the centre of a range of initiatives by a number of platforms. This has translated into a material step up in the range of annuities, capital-protected funds, and longevity protection funds added to the investment menu, as well as the development of new retirement calculators and modelling tools.”

McGivern also noted platforms were expanding their cybersecurity in light of the increased threat to firms. 

“2022 saw all platforms implementing multifactor authentication (MFA), but we believe this is only the beginning. Some providers are already exploring behaviour-based alerting to improve their cybersecurity measures – this will certainly be an interesting area to continue to monitor.”