Tag: Backend Benchmarking
Posted on November 4, 2019
With the release of its latest ADV filing yesterday, one thing is for certain: Wealthfront has had no trouble gathering cash deposits.
Posted on October 18, 2019
We have been very busy here at Backend Benchmarking. We played a pivotal role in saving 10,000 investors from a substantial tax burden, had numerous media appearances and quotes including a Wall Street Journal article by Jason Zweig, published insightful analyses and commentary to our blog, and made progress building our application.
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Posted on September 21, 2019
When digital investing was first introduced, platforms quickly began accumulating assets. Digital advisors were labeled industry disruptors, as talks of fee compression, the commoditization of professional asset management, and disruption of the investment advice industry ran rampant. Digital advice providers had the advantage of emerging during a historic multi-year bull market. Over the last four years, the market has continued to mature, adoption has spread across major financial institutions, and new consumer trends have emerged. An increasing number of companies are battling for market share and institutions have developed their own offerings. In the race to achieve scale, the largest independent advisors continue to expand product offerings to stay a step ahead of incumbent players and maintain impressive rates of asset accumulation.
Posted on September 20, 2019
SoFi, a company initially focused on consolidating student loan debt, has been aggressively expanding into other areas of financial services. Within the past two years, they launched a robo-investing platform, high-interest cash account, and a self-directed brokerage platform with commission-free trading. Most recently, they announced proprietary ETFs offering an introductory 0% expense ratio through June 2020.
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Posted on September 20, 2019
I hope that this post finds you well and that you have enjoyed your summer. The last few months have been quite busy at Backend Benchmarking! Here are some highlights of our progress:
Successful Capital Raise
On June 1, we closed a fundraising round with $3.8 million in equity capital—$3.0M in Preferred Equity and $800K in SAFEs. We also secured a signed letter of intent from Peapack Gladstone Bank for an additional $1 million in debt financing. Once the debt financing is finalized, the total amount raised this year will be $4.8 million!
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Posted on September 6, 2019
In recent years, socially responsible investing (SRI) – also commonly categorized as environmental, social, and governance investing (ESG) – has gained popularity with retail investors and investment managers alike. Between 2016 and 2018, assets invested in ESG-themed mutual funds grew 34%, while assets in ESG-themed ETF funds more than doubled. Driven by consumer demand, a natural expansion has been undertaken by digital advisors to offer separate SRI portfolio options. Within the past few years we have opened and funded SRI accounts at each of the providers that offer sustainable investing options. With a year of performance to review, we have assessed the risk and return statistics of SRI portfolios offered compared to their standard offerings. While today’s focus is on performance, we will publish a full report on the composition of SRI portfolios, including costs and sustainability scores, later this month.
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