Advisors archive
Every Advisors story, newest first. 838 stories
17 stories
- Practice management
Michael Kitces: AI's main effect will be deeper client engagements
At the eMoney Advisor 2026 Summit, he argued time saved on plan preparation flows into additional client work and can support higher fees.
- Succession & selling a firm
DeVoe: RIA deal volume down 17% as broker-dealers enter M&A
LPL, Cetera, Osaic and Raymond James compete with consolidators for the same practices, while $5 billion-plus sellers set a record, DeVoe says.
- Tax & estate planning
Stanford economists estimate California Prop 40 would raise $30 billion
The paper's authors say seven billionaires who left the state took $540 billion, or 30% of California's billionaire wealth, with them.
- Products & portfolios
Morningstar raises Vanguard Global Wellington process pillar to High
The Gold-rated fund returned 13.4% annualized from its May 2023 People upgrade through September 2026, versus 12.5% for the category.
- Recruiting & transitions
Elevation Point takes minority stake in $750M UBS Las Vegas breakaway
Truing will run under Elevation Point's corporate RIA and custody client assets with Goldman Sachs Custody Solutions.
- Practice management
Jump links FMG content to follow-ups; Zocks partners with LPL
Jump flags firm-approved FMG pieces for the advisor to send or drop; Zocks syncs conversation data to LPL's WealthVision Premium planning tool.
- Succession & selling a firm
Beacon Pointe adds $1.35 billion in client assets; Wealthspire buys Atlantic Swiss
Beacon Pointe's three deals push its total past $70 billion in assets under management; Atlantic Swiss oversees more than $1 billion in assets under management and administration.
- Products & portfolios
55ip expands RIA UMA lineup with J.P. Morgan, BlackRock models
The J.P. Morgan Asset Management subsidiary had previously run tax-managed UMAs only for select enterprise partners.
- Tax & estate planning
Devenir: 52% of HSA assets were invested by June 30
Accounts with invested assets hold 59% of all HSA assets and average $23,837 combined, nearly nine times the funded deposit-only average.
- Tax & estate planning
Nationwide survey: nearly three-quarters of Gen Z changed or considered changing portfolios
About 24% of Gen Z respondents said they moved money into more conservative or lower-risk investments before the election, versus 13% of boomers.
- Tax & estate planning
Tax Foundation says Florida Amendment 3 would cut the local property tax base
The analysis says the amendment would leave the cost of local public services in place while removing a significant portion of that base.
- Recruiting & transitions
BofA cuts Ameriprise to Underperform, citing advisor exits and retention loan costs
Analysts lowered their price target to $445 from $570; shares fell 4.07% after BofA cut the rating Monday.
- Products & portfolios
Partners Group cuts fees on €6.6bn Global Value fund ahead of vote
Investors in the distributing fund will pay at least 25 basis points less for three years; holders in the compounding fund get up to 75 basis points off management fees through January 1, 2030.
- Products & portfolios
Mercer Advisors completes Aspen Investing rollout with in-house direct indexing
The platform, developed with Orion, lets advisors set per-client capital gains budgets and runs across Schwab, Fidelity and Raymond James custody.
- Practice management
InvestmentNews column: independent firms can develop associate advisors through strategic projects
An InvestmentNews opinion piece says a CRM conversion or vendor review can teach business judgment.
- Tax & estate planning
Betterment adds mega-backdoor Roth to its solo 401(k) platform
Advisers using Betterment Advisor Solutions get in-platform conversions, 1099-R reporting and automated tracking of contributions against annual limits.
- Recruiting & transitions
ICG next leaves LPL for Osaic with $2.3 billion and acquisition plans
The Wall Township, N.J., firm launched at LPL in 2019 and now has about 21 advisors; transition payments and payout terms were not disclosed.
7 stories
- Tax & estate planning
Average Social Security COLA adds $75 a month in 2027; Fidelity suggests a planning review
A Fidelity viewpoints article published the day after the confirmation outlines three policy approaches to the program's long-term funding gap.
- Practice management
ShinyHunters claimed client data theft at Mercer and Beacon Pointe
Mercer says unauthorized access to systems holding client data is contained and law enforcement was notified; Beacon Pointe's state filing covered three Massachusetts residents.
- Tax & estate planning
Edward Jones: 81% of financial caregivers for adults 65+ would sacrifice own financial security
Among the 84% of caregivers not fully reimbursed, out-of-pocket costs average $8,737 a year, the Harris Poll survey of 3,223 adults found.
- Tax & estate planning
SoFi survey: women 25-45 rank investing 11th among money priorities
Thirteen percent of women named investing as a money priority versus 28% of men, and 45% chose paying down debt as their leading goal.
- Practice management
Jarvis and Shilanski lay out a 30% profitability floor and client color coding
The framework divides money reaching the owner's tax return by everything the client pays, including fund expenses, and targets 30% or better.
- The Advisor's Note
Morningstar: Excluding long-term-care costs cuts U.S. retirement shortfall risk about 25%
Separate F&G and WTW surveys find 51% of pre-retirees plan semi-retirement and 36% of U.S. employees feel financially secure.
- Practice management
F&G finds 51% of pre-retirees plan to semi-retire rather than stop working
A same-day WTW survey found 36% of U.S. employees feel financially secure, down from 46% in 2019.
1 story
- Tax & estate planning
Morningstar research puts retirement shortfall risk at 40%-45%
Excluding long-term-care costs lowers that figure by about 25%, according to a Morningstar article and podcast excerpt.
2 stories
- The Advisor's Note
Mercer Advisors: roughly half of H1 2026 net new assets came from custodian referrals
S&P says the fees paid to custodian partners could limit Mercer's margin expansion, the cost side of a channel the firm says supplies half its growth.
- Products & portfolios
Morningstar says the ideal high-return, low-correlation ETF does not exist
Cheaper access to foreign markets pushed US and foreign stock correlations higher since the 1990s, the analysis finds.
12 stories
- Succession & selling a firm
MarshBerry tallies record 294 U.S. wealth advisory deals through September
Private-equity-backed acquirers took 72% of announced deals through Q3; the ten most active buyers took one-third of all announced transactions.
- Recruiting & transitions
Ameriprise adds three RBC teams with $1.2 billion; Wells Fargo adds $900 million
The RBC teams cited Ameriprise's technology platform and planning capabilities; Raymond James added a $245 million UBS team in Paramus, New Jersey.
- Practice management
Nationwide survey: 56% of investors anxious about midterms' effect on savings
Forty percent of investors changed their retirement savings or portfolio ahead of the midterms, and 73% want an adviser to explain the election’s financial impact.
- Practice management
Docupace launches Next 1.0; Focus Financial names Nevis its AI platform
Docupace says existing workflows and document history carry forward, while Focus made an undisclosed but “significant investment” in Nevis.
- Practice management
DeepVest launches PlanLab, taking its AI planning tool out of beta
The tool pairs an AI assistant with deterministic calculators for Social Security claiming, Roth conversions, RMDs and gifting, and can import an advisor's existing plan.
- Recruiting & transitions
Rockefeller hires $1.2 billion Truist team in Naples, Florida
The Kellam Group produced $7 million in revenue on $1.2 billion of client assets, per a source familiar with the move.
- Tax & estate planning
IRS starts automatic refunds for more than 50,000 adoption tax credit carryforward filers
Notices generally go out within 30 days of the account adjustment, and the agency says no amended return is needed.
- Tax & estate planning
Advised investors ask AI more and verify less, Evergreen.ai study finds
Among advised respondents who used AI for money questions, 41.9% acted without checking against another source or a professional, nearly triple the 14.4% rate among unadvised users.
- The Advisor's Note
Schwab raises tax-aware long-short account minimum to $10 million
The accounts represented $60.7 billion of Schwab's $187.9 billion in client margin loans at the end of September.
- Succession & selling a firm
RIA deal count falls 17% as $5B sellers set record, DeVoe says
Mercer Advisors refinanced $1.9 billion in a Goldman Sachs-led loan, cutting the rate by 1.75 points and saying the savings will fund acquisitions.
- Practice management
FPA and Allianz: 74% of surveyed planners will spend more time per client relationship
The June survey of 387 planners also found 67% expect to evolve their business model; those with under five years of experience were more likely than veterans to say so.
- Products & portfolios
All Magnificent Seven companies fall short of a 1.5°C climate pathway, Morningstar says
Alphabet, Amazon, Meta and Microsoft face heightened climate transition risk as operators of hyperscale data centers, Morningstar says
1 story
- Recruiting & transitions
Schwab Advisor Services net new assets rise 47% in Q3
CEO Rick Wurster drew a contrast with Fidelity after Fidelity told sub-$100 million custody clients to move by June 2027.