Our regular round-up of the latest insights on investment distribution

Financial advisers have been increasing their use of passives in recent years, although this consists almost entirely of index tracker funds. ETFs have still largely failed to gain traction in the adviser community. Advisers have different views on how passives...

Another quarter has come and gone and with it comes the latest wave of adviser platform data. Adviser platforms have grown at 5.4% over Q3 2018 as the overall market steadily approaches the £550bn mark. Equity markets remained largely flat in the quarter – the FTSE...

Advisers continue to rank pricing as their number one consideration when picking a platform. However, as the FCA has recently pointed out, comparing platforms on price can be fiendishly difficult. An individual platform’s charging structure is generally relatively...

It is rumoured that the UK has secured a financial services deal with the EU and staying closely aligned is likely regardless of the final outcome of Brexit anyway. So ‘equivalency’ is on the cards and MiFID II is, in all likelihood, here to stay in the UK....

The big news this week has been the acquisition of Alliance Trust Savings by Interactive Investor. Adding the £15bn of new assets, this makes Interactive Investor a substantial platform – one of the largest D2C platforms, and with a foothold in the adviser market....

Platform M&A activity has been bubbly of late in the UK and Europe, prompting questions on platform valuations. In continental Europe, MiFID II’s complexities will boost outsourcing. Allfunds is expanding rapidly on the back of this and FNZ’s acquisition of...