 In our experience with these advisors, the desire to have more flexibility to develop and grow their own business and the ability to offer more customized solutions to clients are two significant drivers of this trend.”Nick Georgis, Vice President Schwab Advisor Services |
Our Commentary
It is interesting to watch the trends. The movement from the wirehouse model to the independent model gives the advisor greater autonomy and a higher payout in exchange for assuming the business risk of the bricks and mortar. The trend to fee based or fee only RIAs reduces or eliminates the conflict of interest inherent in the commission based model. The income stream generated from the feel based or fee only model creates sustainability for the advisor once they don't have to eat what they kill. The focus becomes selling the process not the product, an enduring solution for both the advisors and their cilents. We will continue to watch the trend away from the IBD. It may be too early to draw conclusions as many IBDs allow outside RIAs to put their securities licenses with the IBD at a 5-10% cost. There are more alternative investment options now packaged and priced for RIAs so the RIA may not need the IBD as they did before assuming that they have fully transitioned over to fee and no longer have 12b(1)s and other trail fees.
