// Author: Bella Caridade-Ferreira

What has Hargreaves Lansdown ever done for us??? eh?

28 Jan 2019 What has Hargreaves Lansdown ever done for us? eh?

Posted at 09:30h in Blog by Bella Caridade-Ferreira 0 Comments
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Well, this month it gave us the Wealth 50 — a slimmed down version of its old Wealth 150 list, which has been a key fund choice influencer since 2003. But given the amount of grief and badmouthing it's attracted from Terry Smith et al, you would be forgiven for thinking that Hargreaves Lansdown was nothing but a brash parvenu muscling on the platform game instead of an experienced platform provider with 30+ years in the industry. But is any of the criticism justified? let's find out.

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Platform industry projections

04 Jan 2019 Where will the platform industry be in five years’ time?

Posted at 09:30h in Blog by Bella Caridade-Ferreira 0 Comments
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For the last 10 years we've produced annual five-year projections based on industry trends and the economic outlook and their likely impact on the platform industry. 2018 has been a challenging environment for the industry with some platforms taking a far larger slice of the action than others. Despite the challenging environment, the overwhelming consensus from platform leaders is that platforms that can support advisers to support their clients have a long-term sustainable future.

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Deconstructing the FCA's interim report into the Platform Study

28 Aug 2018 Deconstructing the FCA’s Platform Study Interim Report

Posted at 08:45h in Blog by Bella Caridade-Ferreira 0 Comments
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The FCA’s interim platform report has already been well and truly thrashed out by trade journals and other research houses. However, we believe that our tools and research are ideal for proactively engaging with the regulator’s long-term objectives and have reviewed the interim report on that basis. But first let’s start with the basics: why, who and what.

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Nucleus aims to float

11 Jul 2018 Nucleus aims to float…

Posted at 17:11h in Blog by Bella Caridade-Ferreira 0 Comments
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Nucleus has finally confirmed what we’d suspected for sometime: it’s going to float on the London Stock Exchange’s AIM market. Transact was the first to take the plunge on 2nd March and in the same month AJ Bell announced that it was preparing a flotation in late 2018/early 2019. Nucleus’s announcement came on 2nd July, but it’s working to a punchy calendar and plans to have the whole thing tied up by late July, which is pretty fast by anyone’s book. 

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Gatekeepers in 2017 v 2016

25 May 2018 What drove Gatekeepers in 2017?

Posted at 10:00h in Blog, Products by Bella Caridade-Ferreira 0 Comments
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We compared Gatekeepers in 2017 to 2016 to look for any emerging trends or changing preferences. But it's safe to say that 2017 can be characterised as a year when Gatekeepers continued to stick with big-name funds, despite their non-appearance as top performers. Meanwhile lesser-known funds outperformed, but were unable to get on fund selectors' radars or if they had been noticed, get fund selectors to up their exposure. Fund groups The fund groups with the most selections in 2017 were still the behemoths of the UK industry. Overall, BlackRock was the most popular, leapfrogging Fidelity and Schroders to become the group

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Fundscape Gatekeepers

27 Mar 2018 The trouble with transaction costs (plus the top 20 funds of 2017)

Posted at 08:00h in Blog by Bella Caridade-Ferreira 0 Comments
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The introduction of transaction cost disclosure was intended to provide greater transparency. However, with an utter disregard for common sense that characterised MiFID2’s generally inglorious introduction, the regulators provided fund managers with two diametrically opposed calculation methodologies. As a result, fund managers, ACDs, data providers and platforms have between them contributed to organisational chaos.

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New technology disruptors in the platform world

17 Nov 2017 New kids on the block in the platform world

Posted at 09:30h in Blog by Bella Caridade-Ferreira 0 Comments
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After almost two decades of the market being dominated by three or four technology providers, there are several new platform technologies emerging. There’s been a lot of noise about Hubwise and Embark, but Seccl will soon be out there drumming up business too. All of them have the potential to disrupt the platform market. Their competitive advantage lies in the fact that they provide pared down, focused propositions that have none of the legacy technology and inefficiencies in existing technologies.

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Are DB transfers all bad or is there other information we need to consider?

15 Nov 2017 Lies, damn lies and statistics

Posted at 10:00h in Blog by Bella Caridade-Ferreira 0 Comments
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ISA activity was less pronounced in the third quarter of 2017, with sales dropping to £1.5bn. However, pensions picked up the slack and generated around 70% of platforms’ net flows. This was due to a combination of investors exercising their pension freedom rights and the steady pipeline of DB transfers.

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The popularity of UK All Companies funds in the Gatekeepers analysis.

24 Oct 2017 Cool Britannia

Posted at 14:55h in Blog by Bella Caridade-Ferreira 0 Comments
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Our Gatekeepers series continues with a review of the UK All Companies sector. View the top ten UK All Companies funds in the second quarter here.

With 225 actively managed funds, the IA UK All Companies sector has been seen as the bellwether for asset allocators looking for broad-based exposure to UK Equities. However, according to the Investment Association, it has been the worst-selling retail sector since 2010 (with the exception of 2013 when sterling corporate bond assumed the mantle).

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