We start with congratulations to Nucleus who announced they had broken through the £1bn barrier last Friday. Well done to all there.
Lots of feedback to last week’s mail about platform due diligence and cost analysis. Comments ranged from a general concern about letting any one particular platform frame the due diligence debate purely in their own terms (thought ‘greed’ership?) to a suggestion that we at The Platforum could play a more constructive role in helping advisers with these issues. If we did this, we’d want buy-in from lots of parties to ensure a fair, representative view.
Earlier in the year we talked to some of the platforms about drafting a common basis template for advisers – at least for initial enquiries - consistent across all platforms for the benefit of both IFAs and platforms. Seems sensible to us but the challenge is of course getting general buy-in and what questions to include – in any RFI drafted by a platform, by omission any dirty washing will remain deeply at the back of the laundry. We’ll get back to you about some of these conversations once we have explored further.
I’d also like to see a subtle change in focus from a generic jostling for position with the question “Who is the best platform” to “Who is the best platform for this particular IFA/client group?” Some platforms out there are getting much more focussed about what type of adviser practice they suit and I suggest that this can only continue as we approach the RDR and the market segments. Interesting comments on the RDR from Transact’s Malcolm Murray on the homepage this week.
Next week we will be publishing our paper on stochastic modelling tools and the role these play on platforms. “Stochastic Modelling Tools – An (amateur) Hitchiker’s Guide To This Galaxy” will be available on our homepage for all subscribers and has been written for a platform and IFA audience. This was produced after a seminar and debate held in October to discuss this – thanks again to Distribution Technology our sponsors. We hope you’ll find it interesting. It will follow on the heels of research out yesterday from Skandia about the use of tools on platforms by advisers (see the News section on the site). We’ll also be carrying a complementary recent piece from Ibbotson Associates on Truncated Levy Flight research for those of you who want to get really heavy!
As (unbelievably) the year draws to a close and we get our ‘house in order’ for 2010, can we draw your attention to our seminar on Employee Benefits Platforms on Jan 28th (only 24 places left); our new research first out in Feb - The (plat)Form Guide - and also early plans for the Platforum IV conference. We’d really like input from any possible sponsors and/or speakers to make sure we keep the discussions topical and punchy. More details of all this on the site.
