Page 16 - Investment Advisor April 2021

ETF ADVISOR

By Bernice Napach

Goldman Unleashes Digital Investment

Platform for the Masses

Also, DFA’s ETF market debut is big success, while Putnam prepares to

enter ETF market.

oldman Sachs, the 150-year-old
investment bank best known
G for serving big corporations
and wealthy investors, has expanded
into investing for the mass market.
It introduced Marcus Invest, a low-
cost digital investing platform, which
offers individual investors three differ-
ent investment strategies populated by
a varying mix of ETFs — core, impact
and smart beta — adjusted for their risk
profile along with regular rebalancing.
“It truly is a seminal moment when
they actually turned on the power and Edge and with the independent robo- its plans for Marcus in December, a
unleashed their robo-advisor into the advisors Betterment and Wealthfront. spokesman told Investment Advisor
wild,” said Tim Welsh, founder, presi- Marcus Invest’s 0.35% fee is the same that the new service would help the
dent and CEO of Nexus Strategy LLC. as the fees charged by Morgan Stanley firm “attract new customers and deepen
“Given Goldman’s brand and reach, the and Wells Fargo but slightly higher than relationships within its consumer and
game has been fundamentally altered. the 0.25% fee for the digital-only servic- Ayco ecosystems,” the latter referring to
No more sleep for retail wealth manage- es of Wealthfront and Betterment and its employer-based financial counseling
ment executives this week!” 0.20% all-in cost charged by Vanguard investment management service.
The minimum investment for Marcus Digital Advisor, according to David Marcus Invest could be conceivably
Invest is $1,000 and the annual advisory Goldstone, manager of research and the first stop for investors who ultimate-
fee is 0.35%, far less than most financial Analytics at Backend Benchmarking, ly move on to Goldman Sachs Personal
advisors charge for more personalized which publishes The Robo Report. Financial Management — the renamed
services. ETF fees for Marcus Invest Fidelity Go and JPMorgan Chase You United Capital that Goldman acquired in
are embedded in the performance of the Invest charge 0.35% for everything, May 2019 headed by Joe Duran, United
funds chosen, and additional fees may including expense ratios for ETFs. Capital’s former CEO — or to Goldman
be levied for specific requests such as When Goldman Sachs announced Sachs Private Wealth Management.
printed statements and check copies.
Marcus Invest is available for indi-
vidual, joint and IRA accounts and is
integrated into the Goldman by Marcus DFA’s ETF Market Debut Is a
consumer banking app, which offers rel-
atively high-yielding savings accounts, Big Success
unsecured personal loans and budgeting
software, as well as an Apple credit card. etter late than never could describe since they launched in November and
With its latest launch, Goldman Sachs BDimensional Fund Advisors’ recent December, with almost half the growth
will compete directly with digital plat- entrée into the ETF market. occurring since Jan.1, 2021, according to Tom/stock.adobe.com
forms of retail-focused giants including The fund company’s first three ETFs Bloomberg News.
Vanguard, Schwab, Fidelity and Merrill have accumulated $700 million in assets The three ETFs — Dimensional

14 INVESTMENT ADVISOR APRIL 2021 | ThinkAdvisor.com