As the average age of the population increases, more and more advisors are finding that their clients are increasingly concerned not only with wealth accumulation, but with seeing that wealth safely transferred to children and grandchildren. For many advisors, the best way to help clients achieve these long-range goals includes the creation of trusts. There are drawbacks to trusts, however, not the least of which is the cumbersome record-keeping and reporting that is required.
At the company's annual Executive Forum, held April 25-28 in Scottsdale, Arizona, Fidelity Registered Advisor Group President Jay Lanigan was eager to talk about some of Fidelity's latest offerings to make that process easier. "We've had advisors coming to us and asking us to help them try to continue to grow their capabilities," he said. So Fidelity has developed an administrative trust service offering for SEC-registered RIAs, under which Fidelity would do administration while allow RIAs to continue to do investment management.
Lanigan noted the growing movement among some RIAs who have set up independent trust companies. "When they do that, they have to start operating like a trust organization. They need to move from portfolio management to using trust recordkeeping. They're going to need to be compliant with the OCC," referring to the Federal Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.
