Page 3 - Investment Advisor April 2021

04.21

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Envestnet Reveals New ‘Personal Financial Ecosystem’

Envestnet is building a new “personal rithms now used by advisors, for any per- education initiatives to help consum-
financial ecosystem” that aims to edu- sonal finance-based digital offerings. ers achieve financial balance, Envestnet
cate consumers and help them better “Essentially, we are now enabling firms to will “deploy algorithms to reshape the
connect with financial professionals — integrate our tried and tested ‘calculation way consumers manage their finances,”
while also improving the user experience brain,’ or the central API engine that makes according to the white paper.
and data-sharing capacity of both advi- Envestnet | MoneyGuide tick, within their “It’s something I have been thinking
sors and consumers. own planning software offerings and prod- about for a while” and “the time is nec-
ucts,” said Tony Leal, president of essary to really push towards this now,”
MoneyGuide, in a statement. Crager said.
“This means firms and advi- The timing of the white paper and
sors can own the fun part of Envestnet’s related moves was partly
creating the client planning influenced by the coronavirus pandemic,
experience, and they can rely on its impacts, Crager’s own experience
our award-winning APIs for the and input he’s received from advisors,
boring, yet essential, math and he says. During the pandemic, “people
algorithms that connect the dots are spending more time thinking about”
of the financial plan.” financial issues, he explained. They “have
While Crager conceded that more time to ask questions, and they are
Apple, Microsoft and other piecemealing together answers.”
tech giants may seek to play a Meanwhile, although “digital has accel-
much bigger role in consum- erated during this period of time, some
ers’ financial lives in the future, really evident problems have accelerated
“It’ll be very interesting to see as well,” he stressed.
“The digital engagement model is not how the market unfolds,” he said. Still, On one hand, “you have the wealth gap
very fulfilling in financial services today,” he stressed: “Envestnet’s incredibly well- just broadening very rapidly,” but you also
said Envestnet CEO Bill Crager in an positioned to be an underpinning [for] have a community that’s “served well and
interview with Investment Advisor. and power the future of what your finan- will be served better by technology going
The ecosystem includes new Envestnet cial life will look like.” forward — the folks who have money,” he
tools, which should be available for advi- Envestnet has a huge amount of finan- said. However, “everybody else is left to
sors over the next few months, that are cial data thanks to its Yodlee business, try to figure that out for themselves.”
designed to serve as advisors’ “super- along with the financial planning capabil- The company’s “thesis is… that there
power to help them bring together the ity it has with MoneyGuide and its ties are consumer apps that Envestnet can
individual’s or family’s financial picture,” to $4.5 trillion of invested assets in the build that will go out into the greater
Crager explained. insurance and credit markets, as well as marketplace — meaning the consumer
There also will be a planned consumer other areas it’s working on, giving it a marketplace — for consumers to educate,
app by year-end that is “like a rope that gets “pretty big footprint,” he explained. understand and then ultimately [use] to
thrown out on the front of the boat that network and connect back to the advisors
helps people understand finance and then ‘Intelligent Financial Life’ who work with Envestnet,” he said.
begin to find the financial advisor who’s on Artificial intelligence will play a key role Through the firm’s algorithms and
the other end of” that rope, he said. in personalizing clients’ experiences with matching based on specific criteria, “We
Separately, Envestnet’s MoneyGuide the new Envestnet environment, Crager can do a very good job of connecting
recently launched MoneyGuideEngine, a said in a recent white paper. human beings to financial advisors if they
collection of its financial planning algo- In addition to integrating financial want one,” Crager added. —Jeff Berman
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