AI Product & Service Launches – 10/12/2026

Morningstar Launches Direct AI

Morningstar Inc. released Morningstar Direct AI, agentic software for its flagship platform with agents for product development, distribution and asset manager research. All three agents incorporate Morningstar’s data, analytics, research and ratings of securities and entities, including funds, equities, fixed income and other financial products.

The product development agent combines Morningstar flows data and category analysis.

The distribution agent uses proprietary Morningstar classifications and portfolio tools. It can analyze portfolios that hold both public and private securities to identify gaps in an existing model portfolio, to demonstrate how changing funds could impact models and to prepare talking points for review meetings.

The manager research agent helps due diligence teams vet investment strategies and analyze both market environments and funds’ trading behavior.

In addition to the Direct AI platform, Morningstar is making its investment intelligence available through Claude, Microsoft Copilot and ChatGPT.

TruChoice, Zocks Offer AI-Powered Tools to Insurance, Annuity Professionals

Zocks Communication Inc. partnered with TruChoice Financial Group, an AmeriLife company and distributor of insurance and retirement planning tools, to provide insurance and annuity professionals with artificial-intelligence-powered meeting and workflow tools.

TruChoice-affiliated professionals can use Zocks to record household, financial and case details from client conversations, documents and emails. That data can be automatically added to carrier applications, fact-finders, intake forms and other documents.

Zocks also automatically drafts meeting follow-ups and customized email replies. It can handle scheduling meetings, including invites, reminders, meeting preparation and follow-up.

Bento Engine Launches MCP Layer

Bento Engine Inc., a software-as-a-service platform for financial advisers, announced a model context protocol layer, giving artificial-intelligence-powered agents secure, real-time access to Bento’s content. The product is built for enterprise buyers, large registered investment advisers and other fintech companies.

Using Bento’s content, AI agents can pre-populate client meeting decks, find personalized advice in client portals, drive retirement-plan engagement, support adviser- and client-facing chatbots, and personalize outreach campaigns at scale.

According to the announcement, enterprise users have control over which agents access which content and in what context. Bento also integrates into client relationship management tools and supports a variety of agentic use cases via model context protocol.