One ofthe pioneers of the master trust industry in Australia, Kevin Wyld, is planning the launch of a new wrap account service through the Beacon Investment Management Services group.
Wyld, the managing director of Beacon, has confirmed the new wrap, to be built around a platform supplied by technology provider Avanteos, is being scheduled for an October release.
Wyld says the wrap would sit alongside, rather than replace, Beacon’s existing flagship master trust.
“We are keeping both services running, the master trust and the wrap. There are some advisers who will still prefer the master trust and our’s works well.
The wrap is just another step forward for us,” he says.
The new wrap will offer advisers consolidated reporting over an array of asset classes, from traditional managed funds and direct share portfolios, to coin collections and the full range of property assets.
Like the Beacon master trust, the new wrap will offer equity to participating dealer groups and financial planners in a bid to generate interest in a financial planning market not starved of choice when it come to investment platforms.
The Beacon master trust, launched in 1999, is currently administering some $200 million invested by a dozen financial planning groups, including Grosvenor Securities and FinPac Financial Planning.
Wyld says Beacon was expecting the wrap service to generate strong interest amongst existing supporters of the Beacon master trust, as well as a new range of planning groups.
“It has been proven by the market that lately wraps have been attracting a lot of money, so we expect a good inflow in the wrap service,” he says.
Wyld is one of the pioneers of the investment platform movement in Australia, starting one of the country’s first master trusts in 1988 while the head of what was then the Bain Financial Planning.
Beacon Investment Management Services, started in 1999 in a joint venture between Wyld and Tower Life Australia, is now 65 per cent owned by advisers and planning groups who support the Beacon master trust.
