Remember the robos?
You know, robo-advisors. We don’t seem to talk much about them anymore, but they’re still around, and growing rather quickly, according to a recent report.
Welcome to another Advisor Tech Talk, where, once again, we have a week where it appears that wealthtech news was more active than overall wealth management news. The technology that aids financial advisors—and provides wealth management services directly to potential clients and other consumers—is eclipsing the traditional industry it was originally built to serve.
And it’s not just our informal comparisons of wealth management and technology headlines that serves as evidence. We’d like to offer a couple of pieces of research as evidence, and the first is some market analysis on robo-advisors, where the U.S. robo market is projected to reach $3.2 trillion by 2033 from a value of $1.4 trillion in 2024, a 10.5% compound annual growth rate, according to a just-released report from Market Research Intellect.
Now, we view these analyses with a lot of skepticism, especially the top-line numbers. Greater wisdom often can be found when one reads on, however. For example, the researchers argue that robo-advisors growth comes from a couple of different directions. One would be traditional wealth management providers adopting robo technology to serve current and prospective clients, expanding the demographics of their client base. Another would be that younger people, especially those who are digital natives, seem to have some preference for the flexibility and automation of robo platforms, as do consumers in Europe and in emerging markets.
The researchers also argued that robo-advisors will only improve and become more attractive to consumers and institutions alike as they are infused with artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies.
On the more academic side of things, another study from AI wealth platform Goodfin
One study, from AI wealth platform Goodfin in partnership with NYU Stern professor Srikanth Jagabathula, found that general purpose AI models can pass a mock CFA Level III exam out of the box with no specific financial or investment training. Top performers included Gemini 2.5 Pro, Glaude Opus 4 and OpenAI reasoning models.
Goodfin followed-up to validate the study by having actual CFA graders review and score the AI responses. The top performing AI models excelled not just at finding the correct answers on multiple choice questions, but also at writing essays requiring analysis, synthesis and strategic thinking.
The study’s results would mean that, while general-knowledge models can perform on equal footing with human financial analysts, a specially trained financial AI model, built on a foundation of robust data, may already be capable of exceeding human capabilities in financial analysis and investment management—not to mention wealth management.
No wonder traditional financial services are taking a back seat to fintech and wealthtech.
Let’s get to those headlines.
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Broadridge
Broadridge Financial Solutions Inc. (NYSE: BR), a global Fintech leader, today announced a new strategic partnership and minority investment in WealthFeed, a leading cloud-based platform that leverages AI capabilities to power lead generation and deepen existing relationships for financial advisors. The partnership brings together WealthFeed’s AI prospecting and real-time money-in-motion insights with Broadridge’s market-leading AdvisorStream marketing platform, helping advisors find, educate and nurture investors through key life events.
Broadridge’s financial advisor marketing solution is live as a standard feature within WealthFeed’s SaaS platform for Independent Advisors, RIA home offices and enterprises. This collaboration will bolster WealthFeed’s lead generation and prospecting capabilities with premium licensed content and automated nurturing capabilities for advisors to engage with clients and prospects. Leveraging WealthFeed’s ability to monitor for money-in-motion events, advisors will also be able to identify moments in time to engage with clients and prospects. WealthFeed’s comprehensive data set has also been enhanced by Broadridge’s InvestorView data, providing predictive insights on a prospect’s potential investable assets.
Broadridge’s investment will help fund WealthFeed’s rapid growth and extensive product roadmap. By connecting unique lead-generation datasets with digital engagement and content marketing tools, Broadridge and WealthFeed are enabling advisor groups to accelerate new client acquisition and increase asset retention.
CAIS
CAIS, the leading alternative investment platform for independent financial advisors, today announced an expansion of alternative investment strategies from leading global asset managers, broadening access for advisors seeking to build more diversified client portfolios.
Over the last year, leading managers have introduced new strategies on the CAIS Marketplace, spanning private equity, private debt, real estate, and infrastructure—delivered through advisor-friendly structures such as interval funds, BDCs, and non-traded REITs.
The CAIS Marketplace menu expansion includes strategies from Ares Management, AQR, BlackRock, Blue Owl, Coller, Eldridge, Fortress Investment Group, Franklin Templeton, Goldman Sachs, Golub Capital, Kayne Anderson, Kennedy Lewis, Morgan Stanley Investment Management, Eaton Vance, Nuveen, Veritas, Vista Equity Partners, and others.
d1g1t
d1g1t, a leading enterprise wealth management technology provider, today announced that Oxford Financial Group, Ltd., one of the largest independent registered investment advisory (RIA) firms in the U.S., has selected d1g1t’s institutional-grade enterprise wealth management platform.
By adopting d1g1t’s advanced platform, Oxford Financial will be able to seamlessly aggregate clients’ financial accounts and investments into a single, consolidated view. This integration aims to enhance reporting and analytics, enabling faster, data-driven decision-making for the firm’s ultra-high-net-worth clientele.
This partnership endeavors to strengthen Oxford’s ability to manage complex portfolios while reducing time spent on manual data management processes, allowing the firm to focus more deeply on cultivating client relationships.
eMoney Advisor
eMoney Advisor (eMoney), a leading provider of technology solutions and services that help people talk about money, today announced the continued expansion of its long-standing efforts to enhance the future of the financial planning profession by increasing access to its financial planning technology through the growth of its University Program, eMoney Certifications and new industry partnerships.
University Program Turns 10
Over the past decade, eMoney has partnered with 160 universities in 40 states through its University Program in which students gain hands-on experience with the same cutting-edge technology used by today’s leading financial advisors. Students pursuing the financial planning profession are provided with access to eMoney and an opportunity to earn their eMoney Certification, which affirms eMoney proficiency and offers a valuable skill for the job market, which places planners in high demand.
Recent eMoney findings from financial planning experts recognize the potential of a talent shortage. They believe technology will help narrow the anticipated gap by creating efficiencies that allow advisors to serve a greater number of clients.1
Expero
Expero, a leader in delivering unforgettable user experiences, today announced that after more than 20 years of designing and developing innovative solutions across industries, it has repositioned the business to focus on financial services. Expero helps clients harness AI to transform user interfaces and workflows, delivering results for over 40 financial firms, including wealth management, asset management and brokerages. Its work includes partnerships with industry leaders like Morningstar and IPC and building AI-driven tools for asset managers with over $1T AUM.
Expero’s decision reflects a deep understanding of the complex workflows that drive financial services and its ability to distill vast, disparate datasets into actionable insights. Its solutions anticipate how finance professionals work – across web, mobile and desktop – enabling them to streamline workflows and accelerate decision-making. That expertise has led to engagements with three of the top five Canadian banks, where Expero is modernizing platforms that simplify plan decision-making while enabling secure, efficient fund analytics, reporting and administration, and AI-driven initiatives with leading asset managers.
In one recent engagement, Sun Life’s Group Retirement Services, which supports numerous Canadian employers in managing workplace savings plans, set out to reimagine their digital tools to be faster, more intuitive and more inclusive. They partnered with Expero to build a modern platform that simplifies plan decision-making while enabling secure and efficient fund analytics, reporting and administration. By partnering with Expero, Sun Life’s Group Retirement Services transformed the way plan sponsors interact with their digital tools – enabling faster, smarter and more inclusive retirement plan management.
Facet
Facet, a pioneer in subscription-based financial planning membership, announced today that tax preparation and filing are now included in its flat-fee membership plans. The expansion reinforces Facet’s commitment to being the single financial partner for its members, covering every major component of financial life: financial planning, estate planning, sophisticated investing including direct indexing and alternatives, and now, integrated tax services.
With tax preparation and filing now part of Facet membership, members no longer face a disconnect between year-round tax planning and the once-a-year act of filing. Depending on their membership level, they can either file federal and state taxes online with expert review or have a certified tax professional handle the entire return. In both cases, filing is directly connected to their financial roadmap, helping to ensure that every deduction, credit and opportunity identified during the planning process carries through to their return.
Facet built this capability by integrating its proprietary technology with april, the only embedded, year-round tax platform designed to power smarter financial decisions. By embedding april’s technology into its platform, Facet transforms what was once a siloed, stressful process into a seamless part of everyday financial planning.
Finloop
Finloop Finance Technology Holding Limited, along with its subsidiaries (“Finloop”), an AI-driven global one-stop Web5 (Web2+Web3) wealth technology platform incubated by Fosun Wealth Holdings under Fosun, today announced the launch of “CashPro,” a pioneering instant liquidity management solution for both retail and institutional clients in Hong Kong. This innovative solution taps into the liquidity platform[1] of BNY Investments, part of BNY (NYSE: BK), a global financial services company.
Finloop’s existing T+0 money market fund solution has facilitated transactions amounting to hundreds of billions of U.S. dollars, underscoring its reliability and operational efficiency. Building on this foundation, the enhanced “CashPro” solution, powered by BNY Investments’ liquidity platform, challenges the traditional T+1 processing restrictions and further streamlines fund processing by enabling same-day interest accrual for subscriptions and supporting hourly redemption.
Through BNY Investments’ liquidity platform, Finloop can access a comprehensive liquidity network, including cash movements and transfer, as well as advanced data and analytics to augment its liquidity management solutions for retail and institutional clients. “CashPro” is expected to help clients optimize cash management through data, which significantly enhances capital flexibility and liquidity efficiency.
Foundation Source
Foundation Source, the leading provider of philanthropic solutions for donors, nonprofits, institutions, and the wealth advisors who serve them, today announced a major expansion of its modern, advisor-led donor-advised fund (DAF) platform. With newly enabled multi-custodial capabilities layered onto its existing white-label infrastructure, the platform offers wealth managers greater flexibility to deliver a personalized, seamless giving experience under their own brand. This enhancement is enabled through a new partnership with BridgeFT, whose WealthTech API serves as the backbone for Foundation Source’s new ability to support multiple custodians – integrating seamlessly with advisors’ existing custodial relationships.
Offered in partnership with sponsoring organization Charityvest, Foundation Source’s turnkey white-label DAF platform is purpose-built for advisors, delivering a tax-advantaged giving solution that’s fully embedded within an advisor’s practice. Through this latest enhancement, which adds custodial data access via BridgeFT’s API, advisors can maintain their preferred custodian relationships – including with the three largest national custodians – while managing DAFs with complete control over branding, investment strategy, and service delivery.
Together, these capabilities position Foundation Source’s platform as the most flexible and customizable DAF fintech solution for advisors – combining investment freedom, custodial independence, and firm-level branding in one streamlined experience.
Franklin Templeton
Franklin Resources, Inc. [NYSE:BEN], a global investment management organization operating as Franklin Templeton, today announced the launch of tax aware long-short strategies on its Canvas platform. The introduction of these strategies is designed to further position Canvas as a comprehensive platform for personalized, tax-managed investing by equipping advisors with an additional tool to meet a range of client objectives while aiming to improve pre- and after-tax returns.
Starting with a U.S. Large Cap 130/30 structure, the suite of strategies will grow to include additional leverage options. Tax aware long-short strategies have shown strong recent industry growth and this launch is a continuation of the firm’s strategy to expand the Canvas investment solution suite, delivering a robust ecosystem of tools to partner firms and advisors.
By combining long and short positions with the use of leverage, tax aware long-short strategies can expand the opportunity to generate excess return while enhancing tax benefits through increased loss harvesting potential compared to a long-only direct index. When fit for investors, these strategies provide a powerful tool to diversify concentrated stock positions, prepare for liquidity events, and unlock portfolios constrained by tax lock.
FusionIQ
FusionIQ, the leader in digital wealth management, today announced a strategic partnership with The Greens to provide a market-leading digital wealth platform experience in conjunction with The Greens’ custody and broker-dealer offerings, Green Pier. This collaboration is another step in FusionIQ’s efforts to build a true end-to-end digital wealth platform for modern investors, unlocking the new era of digital custody to deliver the flexibility clients need as they look to provide a differentiated wealth journey to serve the broad demands of today’s investor base.
The Greens is a cloud-native brokerage platform, incubated at the Fidelity Center for Applied Technology® (FCAT®), using modular APIs to facilitate real-time money movement, clearing, settlement, trading, and account management. By integrating these capabilities, FusionIQ will provide financial institutions and their customers with greater flexibility to adapt to market demand.
FusionIQ’s turnkey technology empowers financial institutions to simplify the wealth management and investing experience with a configurable private-label platform built in as little as six weeks. The collaboration with The Greens will further enable seamless experiences for employees and investors alike.
Impact Communications
Impact Communications, Inc. (Impact), an award-winning marketing and PR firm that has since 1993 exclusively served the financial services industry, is formally announcing that Jonny Swift has been appointed President of the firm. Swift, who has been with Impact for 15 years, previously served as Vice President and Senior Relationship Manager. The leadership team intentionally chose to make the announcement via the Future Proof Festival conference app and on social media earlier this month, signaling the firm’s commitment to community-first, digital communication.
Impact founder Marie Swift will remain in her role as CEO and chief visionary, leading strategic planning conversations for select clients, speaking, and making public appearances, while collaborating with Impact’s steering committees and client service teams. In his new role as President, Jonny Swift will lead day-to-day operations while continuing to manage key client relationships and drive innovation across Impact’s service offerings.
Mr. Swift brings a wealth of expertise to the presidency. Over his tenure with Impact, he has specialized in digital media strategy, public relations, content creation, and data-driven marketing insights. His extensive experience and advanced education, including a Master of Science in Predictive Data Analytics with a concentration in Marketing from DePaul University, equip him to lead the firm into its next phase of growth.
Intention.ly
Intention.ly, the leading growth engine for financial services firms, today announced the launch of its custom-built client portal, now available online and via iOS and Android. The new platform represents the latest step forward in the growth consultancy’s ongoing mission to set the client experience standard for firms supporting financial services organizations.
Building upon an existing foundation of transparency, accountability, and collaboration, Intention.ly has developed a complete web-based and mobile-friendly environment consolidating everything partner firms need to manage their relationship in one streamlined platform.
Clients can also communicate directly with their dedicated Intention.ly team members through the portal and mobile app.
InvestCloud
GROW with Singlife (“GROW”), an integrated investment platform under leading financial services company Singlife, has launched its enhanced adviser and client platform – marking a key milestone in its strategy to scale wealth solutions and elevate adviser-client experience in Singapore. The upgraded platform empowers GROW’s financial adviser representatives (advisers) with advanced tools to deliver more personalised advice, streamlined servicing, and stronger client engagement.
Developed in partnership with InvestCloud, a global leader in wealth management technology, GROW’s new state-of-the-art platform represents a major step towards its vision to equip advisers with innovative digital tools and provide a differentiated wealth planning journey for their clients.
The transformed GROW platform is designed to optimise every aspect of the adviser-client journey. By leveraging InvestCloud’s advanced technology, advisers will be able to streamline client servicing, deliver curated portfolio solutions, and provide access to exclusive investment products. Clients, in turn, will benefit from greater clarity, control and confidence over their wealth journeys.
K1x
K1x Inc., the fintech company behind the industry-leading Aggregator Plus®, today announced the launch of new W-2 data extraction capabilities. This expansion makes K1x the only provider unifying unstructured and structured K-1, 1099, and W-2 data extraction in a single, patented platform, helping tax professionals eliminate up to 90% of manual entry.
Each busy season, CPA firms, corporate tax teams, family offices, and private wealth advisors spend countless hours collating K-1s, reconciling 1099s across brokerages, and keying in W-2s. Aggregator Plus® addresses this challenge by extracting both structured and unstructured data—including footnotes, attachments, K-3s, and state filings—into clean, review-ready formats.
By consolidating compliance into one platform, Aggregator Plus helps advisors to scale high-net-worth relationships without adding headcount, reduce error-prone manual processes, and accelerate compliance cycles.
MarketAxess Holdings
MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (Nasdaq: MKTX), the operator of a leading electronic trading platform for fixed-income securities, today announced the global launch of Axess IQ Connect, a lightweight web-based application for Private Banks and Wealth Managers that is accessible on any device and designed to connect client advisors to their trading desks.
Axess IQ Connect is an extension of Axess IQ, a “one-stop-shop” Execution Management System (EMS) and order workflow solution designed to enhance speed, efficiency and transparency in fixed-income trading for Private Banks. The web-based app provides client advisors with transparent, direct access to live market insights, including high-quality liquidity data, as well as bond pricing powered by CP+, MarketAxess’s AI-powered real-time pricing engine, along with real-time visibility into their order queue.
Additional key features include interactive watchlists and an optional order management function, which allows advisors to submit client orders from Axess IQ Connect directly into their trading desk’s Axess IQ order queue to track execution status in real-time from order entry to trade completion.
Praxis Solutions
Praxis Solutions is excited to announce its most recent expansion with the acquisition of WEALTHAWK, an AI technology platform that identifies “money-in-motion” events identifying clients at the moments they most need professional financial guidance.
WEALTHAWK has already earned industry recognition, including Financial Planning’s Innovation Award in Lead Gen Tech, and was spotlighted by influential thought leader Michael Kitces, who called its approach “a new category” on his FinTech Map.
Purpose-built for advisors, WEALTHAWK pinpoints numerous key financial life events such as IPOs, M&A events, estate transitions along with numerous other events. With over 400,000 prospects in its database and the backing of Praxis’ powerful distribution engine, WEALTHAWK offers precision in helping advisors find clients during life’s most critical financial transitions.
Prove
Prove, the leader in digital identity, and Backbase, the world’s first AI-powered banking platform, today announced a strategic partnership aimed at transforming how financial institutions onboard new customers in the United States. The integration brings together seamless, identity verification and secure customer experience to address two of the biggest challenges in digital banking today: fraud prevention and onboarding friction.
By embedding the Prove Pre-Fill® solution into the Backbase AI-powered Banking Platform, banks and credit unions can now offer a dramatically improved account opening and digital lending experience. With a customer’s consent, the Prove Pre-Fill solution uses their mobile phone number to instantly populate online forms with verified information like their Social Security number, name, address, and date of birth. This eliminates the need for manual data entry, creating a smoother customer experience with fewer errors and lower abandonment rates.
The solution also fortifies fraud defenses at the front door. The Prove Pre-Fill solution verifies customer information in real-time using Prove’s Identity Graph – a dynamic map of linked devices, credentials, and identifiers that allows Prove to confirm identity deterministically. Due to the effectiveness of the technology, bad actors self-select out resulting in less fraud, while customers experience a seamless onboarding journey.
S&P Global
Crisil, an S&P Global Company, announced the acquisition of McKinsey PriceMetrix Co. (“PriceMetrix”), a leading provider of performance benchmarking and data-driven insights for the wealth management industry.
PriceMetrix, based in Toronto, serves leading wealth management firms in the U.S. and Canada. Its proprietary database covers $8 trillion in assets under management and 30 million investment accounts, backed by 25 years of data. The acquisition includes key products such as ValueOne, FeeCheck, CommissionCheck, SignalOne, advisory services, and comprehensive surveys of the North American wealth management sector.
This planned acquisition aligns with Crisil’s strategy to scale in wealth management and extend sector benchmarking capabilities to large global banks, traditional wealth managers, and registered investment advisors (RIAs.
Savvy Wealth
Savvy Wealth (“Savvy”), a digital-first platform for financial advisors centered around modernizing human financial advice, today announced the appointment of Anshul Sharma as chief investment officer (“CIO”). Sharma, a wealth management veteran with more than 25 years of experience building multi-billion-dollar investment platforms, will lead Savvy’s investment office as the firm scales past $3 billion in assets under management (“AUM”). He will be based in New York City, where he will work closely with Savvy’s leadership team and advisors nationwide to help shape the future of investment management for high-net-worth clients.
In this role, Sharma will be tasked with building Savvy’s first institutional-grade CIO office to directly support the independent advisors and advisory teams at its affiliate registered investment advisor (“RIA”), Savvy Advisors. He will help bring portfolio strategy in-house, streamline model portfolios and deliver timely guidance that helps advisors explain the “why” behind investment decisions. Sharma will also expand access to alternatives and thematic strategies while overseeing enhancements to the firm’s proprietary investment platform, Savvy Wealth Investment Management, equipping advisors with the tools and education to support the holistic investment needs of clients and attract prospects.
Prior to joining Savvy, Sharma held senior roles at leading wealth management and private banking institutions, including Bank of America, U.S. Trust, and Merrill Lynch. Over the course of his career, he has helped scale investment platforms and drive investment strategy across multiple asset classes while partnering with advisors to enhance portfolio construction. He will bring this expertise to Savvy’s investment office to expand offerings and support advisors in delivering differentiated client solutions.
Tilt
Tilt, the AI-powered direct indexing platform, has raised a $7.1 million Seed round led by Portage and Lerer Hippeau, with participation from Golden Ventures, Real Ventures, Cumberland Investments, and FJ Labs. The company will officially launch the platform behind a waitlist on September 22nd at Portage’s Confluence event.
Tilt is pioneering a new approach to wealth management by enabling advisors, TAMPs, and RIAs to deliver scalable, zero-minimum indices with real-time tax optimization, starting at 3 basis points. With Tilt’s platform, anyone can build an index for anything in minutes through an AI-driven thematic research process—democratizing access to institutional-grade indexing and personalization.
At the core of Tilt’s technology is an embedding engine that continuously ingests, parses and scores an opinionated set of documents, from SEC filings to news articles and social media, surfacing both consensus and emerging themes in the process. This always-on processing allows Tilt to power new types of structured products, rebalance indices at higher frequencies, and unlock the long tail of personalization that advisors and investors increasingly demand.
YCharts
YCharts, a leading investment research and client engagement platform, today announced the launch of individual bond data. This new dataset expands YCharts multi-asset coverage and gives wealth management firms faster, clearer ways to evaluate and communicate fixed income strategies.
In today’s post-ZIRP environment, renewed attention on the income side of portfolios makes access to bond data essential for advisors and clients alike as they refocus on the “40%” of the 60/40 portfolio.
This expanded data coverage reflects the ongoing mission of YCharts to simplify workflows, strengthen client engagement, and power smarter investment decisions across every asset class. Future updates will broaden these datasets even further.
