Products & Services September 26, 2024

Product & Service Launches – 9/26/24

Altruist launches digital fixed-income trading for RIAs; BlackRock taps Vestmark for custom model portfolio partnership; and Alight adds firms offering mental health, fertility support to partner network.

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Altruist Launches Digital Fixed-Income Trading for RIAs

Altruist Corp. has launched a digital fixed-income trading center for registered investment advisers.

The platform offers RIAs the ability to look at real-time pricing and bond inventory across certificates of deposit, corporate bonds, government agency securities, municipal bonds and U.S. Treasurys. It also has a “click-to-trade” option on the Altruist platform, with the goal of minimizing transaction costs and helping advisers “trade bonds without ever having to pick up the phone,” according to the announcement.

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“Technology has propelled the financial advice industry forward, yet fixed income trading has lagged behind,” Harpreet Ahluwalia, chief product officer at Altruist, said in a statement. “When you make it easier for advisers to navigate the bond market, clients benefit from more predictable cash flows and deeper portfolio personalization.”

The new center is backed by a partnership with Moment Technology Inc., a fixed-income trading platform.

Vestmark, BlackRock Partner on Custom Model Portfolios

Wealth management software provider Vestmark Inc. has signed a commercial partnership with BlackRock Inc. to provide custom model portfolios for registered investment advisers.

The partnership will combine Vestmark’s “VAST” personalized investing and tax management tool, launched in 2023, with BlackRock’s ability to build model portfolios at scale.

BlackRock will offer its RIA custom model portfolios through Vestmark’s marketplace, which offers a unified managed account platform for investments including mutual funds, exchange-traded funds and separately managed accounts, among others.

“This collaboration strengthens our position as a prominent solution that combines advanced portfolio management with tax management capabilities,” Vestmark CEO Karl Roessner said in a statement.

Vestmark supports six of the 10 largest managed account platforms in the industry, according to the announcement.

Alight Partners With Firms Offering Employee Well-Being, Fertility Support

Alight Inc. has penned partnerships with two employee benefit firms to expand its offerings to employers.

Alight will now offer benefits via Journey, an employee assistance program focused on mental health and well-being support, and Carrot Fertility, which offers fertility and family-building support.

Journey offers a preventative mental health and well-being service that seeks to engage employees on a daily basis; the benefit is designed to “prevent issues, reduce turnover, address burnout and promote overall employee wellbeing,” according to the announcement.

Offerings include live coaching, access to trained clinicians with a three-day average wait time and services in multiple languages.

 Carrot Fertility offers fertility benefits that provide services from pre-pregnancy through menopause. It is a global service with localized content connecting to more than 11,000 clinics, attorneys, agencies and service providers, according to the announcement.

“By integrating Journey and Carrot Fertility into our partner network, we are further empowering employers to provide individualized care that meets their employees’ needs to help foster a healthier, more engaged workforce,” Missy Van Brocklin, vice president of partners at Alight, said in a statement.

Compliance September 25, 2024

GOP Bill Introduced in Senate to Permit CITs in 403(b) Plans

The latest bill is one of several pending measures that aim to allow 403(b) plans to invest using the cheaper investment vehicle.

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Several Republican members of the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs have introduced a bill that would allow 403(b) plans to invest using collective investment trusts—something many in the retirement industry have been pushing for because of the cost savings the CIT structure offers.

The provision is part of a broader bill, the Empowering Main Street in America Act of 2024, which aims to promote greater capital formation in U.S. public and private markets, expand investment opportunities for retail investors, foster investor confidence and hold regulators accountable through increased oversight.

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The bill, S.5139, would amend the Securities Act of 1933 and was introduced by Senator Tim Scott, R-South Carolina, the ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee. Senators Mike Crapo, R-Idaho; Mike Rounds, R-South Dakota; Thom Tillis, R-North Carolina; John Kennedy, R-Louisiana; Bill Hagerty, R-Tennessee; Cynthia Lummis, R-Wyoming; Katie Britt, R-Alabama; Kevin Cramer, R-North Dakota; Steve Daines, R-Montana; and Jerry Moran, R-Kansas, are co-sponsors of the bill.

Under Title II (“Responsibly Expanding Investment Opportunities for Retail Investors”) of the bill, Section 205 would allow 403(b) plans to invest in CITs.

CITs can be cheaper and more flexible than mutual funds, in part because the instruments are not securities and do not need to be registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Instead, CITs are considered a bank product and regulated by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.

A separate bill that would allow 403(b)s to include CIT investments was introduced in August by a bipartisan group of senators, including Britt, as well as Senators Gary Peters, D-Michigan; Bill Cassidy, R-Louisiana; and Raphael Warnock, D-Georgia.

Since being introduced, that bill, which reflects an amendment to the Retirement Fairness for Charities and Educational Institutions Act of 2024 (S.4917), has been read twice and referred to the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs. The bill proposes to amend the Investment Company Act of 1940 to allow 403(b) plans, as well as certain 401(a) plans, governmental plans and church plans, to invest using CITs.

Similar to the Empowering Main Street in America Act, this bill also proposes to amend the Securities Act of 1933.

The Retirement Fairness for Charities and Education Institutions Act was an amendment to the larger Expanding Access to Capital Act of 2023, passed by the House of Representatives in March.

The various bills aim to complete an effort begun in the SECURE 2.0 Act of 2022 to enable 403(b) plans and governmental plans subject to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act to invest in instruments beyond the annuity contracts and mutual funds to which they are now limited.

Spokespeople for Britt and Scott did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the likelihood of either bill being passed in the House or Senate this year.

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