Fidelity's tool for the ultra rich
Everyone is going after rich customers. No secret there. I see and hear advertisements for "preferred client services", "wealth managent", etc. offered by white-glove firms and brand-name financial services corporations alike. Rich customers are good customers to have.
But there's rich, and then there's ultra rich -- people with $75 million or more in assets. Someone with $75 million won't be worrying about mobile phone bills, or cutting cable TV. People like this have money to burn, and are probably way too busy to manage it effectively on their own.
Or are they? Fidelity is rolling out a new "family office" service next year aimed at families with $75 million or more, which will allow them to track all of the accounts and investments, ranging from art collections to vacation homes. The service will apparently allow permissions to be set so the family head can see all of the assets, but children, trustees, and accountants can only see part of the picture.
It's not clear how this family office platform will dovetail with Fidelity's existing services and products, or how much it will cost.
The service will apparently be released in late 2006, according to the Wall Street Journal.
There have been a few major changes at Fidelity Investments in the past month. I mentioned one of them in a previous post -- the changing of the guard at Fidelity Magellan -- but there has been another behind-the-scenes shift involving the Johnson family, which ... Read
As I blogged earlier this week, Fidelity has a retirement planning service aimed at retirees. Read
Big shake-up brewing at Fidelity's Magellan fund. Bloomberg's Chet Currier reports the current Magellan manager, Bob Stansky, is leaving, to be replaced by Harry Lange, the manager of Capital Appreciation and Fidelity Advisor Small Cap. Read
I'm looking at a Fidelity advertisement in the latest issue of Kiplinger's (the second page spread in the November 2005 issue). It's amazing how deceptive it is. "Add staying power to your portfolio," and "Experience, value, and a focus on long-term performance set our funds ... Read
Oh Buffy dear, I was just dying for some software to manager my antique thimble collection. How darling.
;-)
My inclination has been to go the other way and serve the millions of 20-somethings and 30-somethings who need help with smart incremental investing. The move of the big shops to the richest clients leaves a nice niche for those of us interested in this market position.
I think it's interesting that Fidelity is offering this service to ultra rich people, but I have to give credit to Fidelity for also offering a lot of tools to ordinary people too, via the Fidelity.com website -- research tools, portfolio "analysis" (admittedly, pretty bare bones), etc. These tools aren't the same, but on the other hand, I don't have the need for my heirs to check on the values of my antique thimble collection, either ...
