Our regular round-up of the latest insights on investment distribution

Technology in the advice process

Few technology shifts turn out to be big one-off developments that supersede everything that went before them. Many are fairly mundane day-to-day affairs that slowly integrate themselves into our lives. Robo-advice has picked up plenty of news coverage in recent...

How advisers are using passives

Financial advisers have been increasing their use of passives in recent years, although this consists almost entirely of index tracker funds. ETFs have still largely failed to gain traction in the adviser community. Advisers have different views on how passives...

UK adviser platform assets up, but flows decline

Another quarter has come and gone and with it comes the latest wave of adviser platform data. Adviser platforms have grown at 5.4% over Q3 2018 as the overall market steadily approaches the £550bn mark. Equity markets remained largely flat in the quarter – the FTSE...

Pondering platform pricing

Advisers continue to rank pricing as their number one consideration when picking a platform. However, as the FCA has recently pointed out, comparing platforms on price can be fiendishly difficult. An individual platform’s charging structure is generally relatively...

Price fixing

The big news this week has been the acquisition of Alliance Trust Savings by Interactive Investor. Adding the £15bn of new assets, this makes Interactive Investor a substantial platform – one of the largest D2C platforms, and with a foothold in the adviser market....