Note from the Publisher: Since we've been publishing, and even before, the wealth management industry has been focused on ROBOS, ROBOS, ROBOS. "Will they take over my practice, put me out of business, render me obsolete?" We've addressed that several times, including most recently in this piece: FintekNews OpEd - How Robos May Evolve & How Wealth Managers Must Adjust. Now comes word that at recent T3 Advisor Conference, the biggest topics of them all were RegTech, in anticipation of the coming DOL Fiduciary Rule, as well as cybersecurity.
"..........Unlike previous years’ T3 agendas, which were stuffed with robo-advisor themes, trending topics this year at T3 Enterprise were focused on how to comply with growing regulatory and cybersecurity requirements.
Due to the current troubles of the early robo-advisors, which are now experiencing slowed growth and executive turnover, and are being fully challenged by big online brands that have gone mainstream with robos for their self-directed clients, it appears that human advisors are no longer threatened by these annoying upstarts.
However, the next boogeyman on the block for an ever-worried industry is the growing specter of new regulatory changes and how to comply without blowing up advisor income statements.
Accordingly, top of the agenda at the conference was the Department of Labor’s new best interest fiduciary requirement for retirement accounts. A vast, sweeping piece of regulation, the DOL rule is quickly becoming one of the biggest changes to the business of delivering financial advice since the deregulation of commissions in the 1970s that created the discount brokerage phenomenon, and which ultimately led to online trading, the rise of independent RIAs and more."
Read Full Article at ThinkAdvisor