After almost 20 years of building RIA partnerships, Wallman and Vigrass saw an opportunity to take a leadership role in the rapid growth of ESG and impact investing. In 2016, FOLIOfn acquired First Affirmative Financial Network, an RIA pioneer in sustainable investing that brought time-tested ESG and impact product solutions to the platform. FOLIOfn can now offer these investment products to other RIAs that use the platform for trading and record keeping. FOLIOfn also acquired the SRI Conference, which has been the premier U.S. sustainable investing event for 28 years.
Now that the work of integrating the diverse moving parts of the new FOLIOfn business model has been under way for a year, Wallman is optimistic about the future: “We’re in the right place at the right time to offer cutting edge technology to advisors and enterprises through a well-established RIA platform, and to expand the educational reach of the premiere ESG and Impact conference venue in the industry.”
The growth of ESG and impact investing have become sustainable in recent years through the convergence of ESG materiality-focused metrics with quantitative data analytics. Assuming this trend continues, FOLIOfn should be well positioned to help many more advisors and enterprises use digital investing technology to scale their business and meet clients’ needs.
Paul Ellis founded Paul Ellis Consulting to work with financial advisors who want to integrate sustainable and impact investment strategies for their clients.