The coming of digital in the substantially conservative world of wealth management requires either an open-minded attitude and a willingness to think around new concepts that can easily make comprehension and adaptation hard to achieve.

Because of this, dedicated media come out with creative explanations, rich in metaphors and analogies, that can eventually enable a right approach to new technologies and regulations.

Robo-advisory and Universal Gravitation

One of the most interesting posts is entitled Albert Einstein and my Robo-Advisor by Paolo Sironi, thought leader at IBM. Sironi redesigns the gravitational system of wealth management, explaining it with the terminology from the theory of relativity. He paints a vivid image of how robo-advisory is changing the relationships among products, customers, and advisors:

Why is there a need to change the Wealth Management relationship and centre it on clients first? Because clients are the major mass in the Wealth Management universe and should not be neglected in modeling financial relationships!

All of this in a space where the impact of MiFID 2 regulation, finally to start at the beginning of 2018, begins to be felt.

High Terrain Consulting

Nicola Ronchetti from GfK writes (in Italian) on Advisor Online about a sector still being late to comply with MiFID 2 (with exceptions). He gives advice useful in this and other circumstances, inspired to… mountaineering [translated from the original]:

The consultant’s duty is the mountain guide’s main duty: to keep the customer on the right path, safe from crevices and avalanches.

Precious advice especially when the consultant becomes robotic, or hybrid, the latest and more productive trend.

They maybe, but always down-to-earth and based on a solid knowledge of the matter, able to clarify the current evolution of wealth management to everyone. Two recommended readings, even on vacation…