Hello, friends, welcome to a holiday week- and vacation-truncated Advisor Tech Talk, where we will run down all of the recent financial advisor technology and wealthtech headines we can find for you.
We usually reserve this space for a little commentary, some spot news, survey results and other statistics regarding finance, wealth managment and financial planning, but, to be perfectly honest with you, dear reader, we’re looking out on a very sunny Atlantic Ocean and an absolutely pristine beach, and our five-year-old son is asking to go play.
As much as we’re dedicated to wealth management and financial advisor technology news, some things are just too important to work through, and our son’s childhood is one of those things. We will always reject any work that places monetary gain over the people we love, even for subsistance. No salary or benefit, no matter how great, is ever worth losing time with our families and children.
Priorities, Priorities.
Let’s get to your headlines.
Are you and your firm AI-Ready? Join AICFP today and receive education certification for financial professionals and more – click here for more info!
Allocate
Allocate, the private markets operating system for wealth advisory firms and fund managers, today shared highlights from its fourth annual Beyond Summit, in Park City, Utah. The expansion, a unified data and AI layer spanning the private markets ecosystem, extends Allocate’s infrastructure across the full fundraising and investment lifecycle, streamlining how capital moves between advisors, their clients, and fund managers.
The announcement comes at an inflection point for the industry, marked by the emergence of the wealth channel as a primary capital source and the convergence of private and public markets. With more than 360 wealth firms now on the platform and over 4.2 billion in assets, Allocate is scaling the infrastructure behind a network it has spent years building.
Today, advisors evaluating private market investments face a fragmented, inconsistent process, with manual workflows for each fund. GPs are being asked to deliver an institutional-quality experience to a growing investor base, often using tools that weren’t built for the wealth channel. At the same time, LPs expect a simpler, more consistent way to access and evaluate opportunities.
Apex Fintech Solutions
Apex Fintech Solutions Inc. (“Apex”), the infrastructure powering modern investing, today announced that Cash App Investing has selected Apex Clearing Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Apex, as its new clearing provider. The integration will support Cash App Investing’s millions of customers and leverage Apex’s proprietary AscendOS™ technology platform to support its continued growth and innovation in democratizing investing for everyday Americans.
Cash App Investing is provided through Block, Inc.’s Cash App platform, which serves more than 59 million monthly transacting actives. Cash App Investing selected Apex after an extensive evaluation process to support its next chapter of growth. The strategic alliance represents a significant milestone for both companies, combining Cash App’s user-centric approach to investing with Apex’s cutting-edge clearing, custody, and trading infrastructure, Apex AscendOS™.
Cash App Investing customers will continue to access and manage their investments through the familiar Cash App interface while benefiting from Apex’s robust clearing, custody and trading infrastructure. The collaboration supports all existing account features, including dividend reinvesting and Round Ups, along with robust security protocols and infrastructure designed for high-volume, real-time processing.
Dispatch
Dispatch, the data orchestration layer for wealth management firms, today introduced Advisor Transitions (‘Transitions’), an industry-first software solution designed to help firms transition advisors, client accounts and assets between firms. The launch formalizes Transitions as the fourth core workflow on the Dispatch platform alongside account opening, client onboarding and real-time data synchronization.
The launch comes as the wealth management industry navigates a historic surge in advisor movement. Registered investment advisors (RIAs), broker-dealers and aggregator platforms are onboarding advisors and client assets at an unprecedented pace, increasing demand for infrastructure that can support faster, more scalable transitions without disrupting operations or the client experience.
Built on the core Dispatch platform, Transitions ingests unstructured client data from source systems and documents, standardizes and cleanses it, and applies proprietary AI to merge, match and reconcile records across custodians, CRMs and financial planning tools. From a single workflow, operations teams can generate accurate firm and custodial forms for client signatures, open accounts across multiple custodians in parallel and maintain synchronized data across the advisor technology stack once the transition is complete. In practice, firms using Dispatch accelerate transition timelines by fourfold, reduce complex household onboarding from five hours to roughly 30 minutes, and minimize Not-In-Good-Order (NIGO) rates by 90% through pre-submission data validation.
Empathy
Empathy, the technology company transforming how the world plans for and navigates life’s hardest moments, today announced the addition of Empathy Connect™ to its offerings. This addition brings together legacy planning, bereavement support, and enterprise solutions into one connected experience for insurance and wealth professionals. The announcement marks a significant step forward in Empathy’s evolution from comprehensive care for families delivered via the largest insurance and financial institutions, to an enterprise-grade platform that bolsters organizations’ ability to proactively support people before, during, and after life-changing events.
Empathy Connect is an enterprise portal that enables financial institutions to engage and support the people they serve, when they need it most with Empathy’s user-facing products. Today those include Empathy Loss Support™, an innovative blend of advanced technology and human-first bereavement support, Empathy LifeVault™, a digital legacy planning and organization tool, and Empathy Leave Support™, for employees taking a leave of absence. Empathy Connect simplifies how organizations care for individual families at scale, while helping advisors stay organized, informed, and prepared to support individual clients through some of life’s most critical transitions.
Empathy Connect is designed to help financial advisors, insurance agents, and claims specialists gain greater visibility into client preparedness gaps, providing engagement capabilities that improve planning conversations and generational loyalty. Empathy Connect equips agents with a practical, human-centered way to re-engage policyholders beyond annual reviews and rate conversations. It spurs higher-quality conversations and stronger referral dynamics through more relevant outreach, planning, preparedness, and support. For financial advisors, Empathy Connect assists clients through legacy planning and loss with the guidance and tools that deepen relationships, keep families aligned, and build continuity across generations. For financial institutions, this presents an opportunity to empower advisors with a new solution that will drive higher customer engagement, nurture stronger relationships, and proactively guide clients through their planning journey.
Field
Field launched today as the wealth management technology company building the groundwork for the advisory industry. Led by Bill Crager, co-founder and former CEO of Envestnet, and a founding partner of iAltA, the platform translates, understands, and acts on the data advisory firms generate across dozens of disconnected systems.
The advisory industry digitized individual workflows over two decades — portfolio management, financial planning, CRM, compliance, billing. Each system solves its problem well. None were built to work together. Clients now expect holistic advice across all of it, and the operational complexity compounds. Advisors carry the responsibility for client outcomes, hold the trust, and have been forced to become the integration layer for the industry.
Field builds the layer underneath. The company’s platform integrates data from the systems a firm uses, translates it into a shared language, turns it into firm-level intelligence, and puts both to work where advisors and their teams operate. Enhanced through its recently acquired AI integration layer, the platform extends this foundation further—enabling more intelligent coordination, automation, and insight across systems.
FMG
FMG, a leading marketing technology platform for wealth management and insurance organizations, today announced the launch of its Marketing Intelligence System, a new internal AI-powered platform that gives FMG teams instant access to approved sales materials, customer proof points, product information, campaign assets, and institutional knowledge through natural-language search and AI-assisted retrieval.
The system is designed to help FMG serve advisors and enterprise partners with greater speed, consistency, and relevance. By applying AI first to its own sales, marketing, and customer-facing workflows, FMG is creating a practical feedback loop between internal execution, product development, and customer outcomes.
The Marketing Intelligence System is already in active use across FMG’s sales and marketing teams, drawing on a unified source of truth that includes FMG’s asset library, product briefs, and brand guidelines and voice.
Guardian
The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America® (Guardian) today announced it has appointed Nancy DeRusso as Head of Client Solutions, a role central to furthering the firm’s holistic planning approach to wealth management.
In this role, DeRusso will provide senior leadership across Guardian’s protection and wealth strategy, helping shape how planning, investment capabilities, and intellectual capital come together to support advice that extends across clients’ full financial lives. Her focus will be on strengthening the advisor and client experience and supporting the delivery of personalized, integrated guidance that brings together wealth, insurance, and long‑term outcomes.
DeRusso joins Guardian from Goldman Sachs Ayco, where she held senior leadership roles for more than two decades, most recently as Head of Financial Planning, Financial Wellness, and SurvivorSupport®. Her career spans holistic financial planning, digital advice, advisor development, and enterprise relationship management, as well as direct experience advising ultra‑high‑net‑worth families. She was named managing director following Ayco’s full integration with Goldman Sachs in 2021.
InspereX
InspereX, the tech-driven distributor of fixed income, structured products, exchange-traded funds (ETFs), and alternative investments, today announced that George Barbar has been appointed Chief Commercial Officer. The hire reflects the firm’s continued investment in expanding its distribution capabilities and deepening partnerships across the wealth management ecosystem. Mr. Barbar will report to Scott Mitchell, Chief Executive Officer of InspereX.
Mr. Barbar will lead the firm’s commercial operations, driving growth across business lines, strengthening alignment across sales channels, and advancing the delivery of tailored solutions to partners and clients. His leadership will play a key role in positioning InspereX for its next phase of sustained, long-term growth.
Mr. Barbar joins InspereX from Mesirow, where he began his tenure in 2010 and most recently served as Senior Managing Director and Head of Regional Development and Strategy. In that role, he led the firm’s expansion throughout the Southeast and oversaw key fixed income businesses, including rates, government agencies, supranationals, CDs, and structured products. Prior to Mesirow, Mr. Barbar held positions at BNY Pershing and LaSalle Bank.
IPO CLUB
IPO CLUB, the pre-IPO co-investment platform specializing in short-duration venture funds across six strategic sectors, today launched the IPO CLUB Advisor Desk, a gated workspace built for registered investment advisors and wealth managers who want to size pre-IPO exposure for their clients.
The Advisor Desk consolidates into one verified members area every artifact an advisor needs to evaluate, allocate, and report on private-market managed funds. Inside, advisors find a live pre-IPO deal pipeline with sectors, minimums and allocation windows; valuations reports covering more than 120 companies, refreshed quarterly; a compliance-cleared due diligence pack with full subscription documentation; the manager’s GP profile and Fund I track record; a client-ready one-pager; and a Q&A knowledge base covering accreditation, IRA mechanics and fees.
IPO CLUB’s flagship vehicle, America 2030, is a five-year, actively managed secondary fund that invests in late-stage U.S. and allied companies across the six sectors the firm views as foundational to U.S. resilience and sovereignty: Defense, Energy, AI Infrastructure, Robotics, Critical Minerals, and Space. Current portfolio holdings include Loft Orbital, Shield AI, SambaNova, Lightmatter, Redwood Materials, Newcleo, Kodiak AI, Terradepth, and Impossible Metals.
Kyndryl
Kyndryl (NYSE: KD), a leading provider of mission-critical enterprise technology services, and Broadridge Financial Solutions, Inc. (NYSE: BR), a global Fintech leader, today announced an extension of their longstanding relationship strengthening core platforms and integrating AI-enabled operations alongside quantum-safe capabilities. Under the expanded agreement, Kyndryl Bridge, Kyndryl’s AI-powered, open-integration platform, and Kyndryl’s Agentic AI Framework will be leveraged to support Broadridge’s strategy to drive the democratization and digitization of investing, simplify trading and modernize wealth management.
As part of the agreement to strengthen resiliency, scalability and cryptographic protection against emerging risks, Kyndryl will invest in further modernizing Broadridge’s data center, network architecture and core mainframe environment, including a strategic refresh to a next-generation, quantum-safe platform. The transformation will also incorporate AI-enabled capabilities, leveraging the Kyndryl Agentic AI Framework to support more intelligent operations, faster issue resolution and reduced technical complexity.
For Broadridge clients, this collaboration helps strengthen the resiliency, availability and future readiness of the critical platforms they depend on to support trading, communications and other essential financial services operations. Broadridge is better positioned to deliver
Mili
Mili, an AI platform for wealth management firms, and TradePMR, a technology and custodial services provider for registered investment advisors (RIAs), today announced an integration that brings AI-powered advisor workflows directly into TradePMR’s Fusion platform.
Mili runs as a full advisor workflow layer, capturing the client meeting, preparing the supporting documentation, and connecting to the custodial systems advisors use to act on what was discussed.
The integration includes real-time meeting notes without recording the conversation, meeting preparation using context pulled from existing client data, and pre-filled TradePMR forms with built-in NIGO verification across 35+ form types to catch errors before submission. Additional capabilities cover document parsing across 45 document types and natural-language search across TradePMR’s Insight documentation. Automated account opening and ACAT transfer workflows are next on the joint roadmap.
Psympl
Psympl, the Motivation Intelligence platform powered by proprietary Psychographic AI™ for consumer financial services, today announced that Allan Wallander has accepted the company’s offer to join Psympl as Chief Financial Officer following the close of its Seed financing round.
Wallander brings decades of financial and operational leadership experience supporting high-growth technology and SaaS companies through fundraising, scaling, governance, and successful exits. Over the course of his career, he has supported more than 100 companies, including Market6, Factorial Energy, GRIID Infrastructure, Standard Bariatrics, Earthwave Technologies, and Dotloop, contributing to outcomes ranging from $55 million to more than $1.5 billion.
His background spans venture-backed growth companies, IPO readiness, SEC reporting, strategic finance, investor relations, and operational leadership across both public and private organizations.
SoLo Funds
SoLo Funds, the US’s largest community finance platform, is announcing today ‘SoLo IQ,’ the only AI-powered personalized financial LLM assistant that offers members hyper-personalized tips and advice on how to budget, build wealth, and analyze spending behavior to help reach money goals. ‘SoLo IQ’s’ core differentiator leverages nearly a decade of data, infrastructure, and intelligence developed from billions in transaction volume and 2 million+ users on the platform, allowing the model to understand financial behavior at the transaction level better than all known models. This new product release unlocks the power of customized budgeting, cash flow predictions, and risk insights far beyond what other LLMs in the market can do on their own. ‘SoLo IQ’ marks the first time in history that a consumer will be able to securely interact with an LLM that can provide the accurate guidance needed to achieve financial freedom.
LLMs, including the most advanced systems, have limited access to users’ personal financial data, limiting the ability to deliver truly personalized financial insights, budgeting help, or risk assessments at the individual level. ‘SoLo IQ’ was built differently by redefining how AI not only understands, but improves your finances by bringing LLM intelligence and real-world financial context together based on your real-time data – not generic assumptions. To use ‘SoLo IQ’, users connect their financial accounts securely and seamlessly, enabling the power of SoLo IQ to provide personalized financial assistance. SoLo members will immediately have access to SoLo IQ. Non-SoLo members will be able to access SoLo IQ at MySoLoIQ.com. SoLo Funds has deep roots in AI, where it’s been using machine learning technology since its inception to create industry-leading risk models. This product expansion signifies SoLo’s commitment to being an AI-centric fintech company.
Zocks
Zocks, the privacy-first AI assistant for financial services, and Hightower, a national wealth management firm, today announced a new partnership that makes Zocks the exclusive AI assistant offered to Hightower financial advisors.
With this new partnership, Hightower advisors can use Zocks to automate the administrative and operational work that previously consumed hours of manual effort and data entry. Advisors can focus on better understanding their clients and deepening relationships.
Zocks automatically captures information and context from client conversations, turns them into structured data, and syncs them across the systems used by Hightower advisors, including Salesforce as well as financial planning and portfolio management tools. With Zocks, advisors can easily prepare for client meetings and leave each meeting with notes and follow-up tasks immediately sent to clients and synced across connected systems.
