MRA Advisory Taps RightCapital For Client Tools
MRA Advisory Group (formerly Morris Retirement Advisors) has announced a new free financial planning tool for clients called WealthBuilder Planning. The tool is free both to the firm’s clients and to the public.

WealthBuilder Planning allows individuals and families to add their financial accounts onto a platform and track their investments, retirement goals, educational savings accounts, insurance and taxes. It also allows them to manage their estates.

The firm licensed the proprietary service from Right Capital Financial Planning Solutions.

The firm’s CEO and wealth advisor, Marco Lima, said the tool makes advising more collaborative and financial advisors’ conversations with their clients more informative. It also helps the firm market its services to prospects. Lima notes that only a dozen people still use the platform for free—users often end up coming to the firm for help interpreting the tool’s advice and then seek guidance for their financial decisions.

The tool can be licensed for a monthly fee that ranges between $100 and $150 per advisor.

 

RightCapital Launches Student Loan Capabilities
RightCapital, a financial technology start-up, has added a student loan tool to its digital financial planning platform.

RightCapital’s platform, which allows advisors to create customizable financial plans, already features tools for taxes, retirement, investment, insurance, education savings and budgeting. With the student loan extension, advisors can show clients how student loan repayment options such as income-driven repayment plans and public service loan forgiveness programs will impact their finances and financial goals.

Advisors can use the new tool to compare current loans and proposed loans, create interactive flowcharts to display loan repayment options and show the effect of a repayment plan on a client’s retirement.

 

USA Financial Launches New Digital Platform
USA Financial has launched two new programs to assist financial advisors looking to advance in their careers—a blog and an app, known together as Advisor Advancement.

The blog was started by industry professionals to serve as a news resource and practice development training tool. USA Financial says the blog will feature “a variety of media that covers industry topics, including practice management, marketing, compliance, business development and myriad other things that financial advisors may want to hear, rant or lament about.”

Advisors can access the blog’s material through www.advisoradvancement.com, its mobile app (downloadable in the Apple Store or the Google Play store) or on its Facebook and YouTube pages.

 

Cryptocurrency Fund For Institutional Investors
Morgan Creek Digital has launched a new digital fund for endowments, foundations, pensions, wealthy families and sovereign wealth funds looking for exposure to digital assets.

The firm, backed by investment advisor Morgan Creek Capital Management, has partnered with Bitwise Asset Management, a provider of cryptocurrency indexes and index funds. The two have launched the Digital Asset Index Fund to meet rising demand for digital assets.

The fund holds the top 10 largest digital assets, including cryptocurrencies and tokens, and these are reconstituted monthly. The assets are said to undergo “rigorous, rules-based eligibility requirements, including custody qualifications, trade concentration limits and pre-mine restrictions, to qualify for inclusion.” Assets are stored offline to reduce threats from hacking, and they are audited annually.

The new digital fund fuses Bitwise’s index rules and fund management expertise with oversight by Mark Yusko, Morgan Creek’s CIO; Anthony Pompliano, a Morgan Creek Digital partner; and Matt Hougan, the global head of research at Bitwise.

 

Retirement Solutions For Retirement-Focused Advisors
Envestnet Retirement Solutions has created a technology platform to assist advisors with their retirement plan sponsors and scalability.

The Practice Advantage platform features analysis, reporting, tools for client relationship management and requests for proposals, and a database search engine for 5500 forms on employee benefit plans. The investment analysis and reporting features allow advisors to customize reports to a plan sponsor’s individual investment policy statement. The Practice Advantage program enables a holistic view of the entire practice as well.

The digital program has mobile capabilities, too.

Private Capital Group, a registered investment advisor with over $1 billion in assets under management, has partnered with Envestnet Retirement Solutions to provide the Practice Advantage platform to its network of financial advisors.

 

MassMutual Launches Actively Managed Target-Date Funds
As retirement funds grow, they face problems such as inflation, longevity and market risks as well as the fact that they might be invested too conservatively or aggressively.

MassMutual Life Insurance Co. has designed a new series of target-date funds for its retirement plan sponsors. Subadvised by T. Rowe Price, the MassMutual Select T. Rowe Price Retirement Funds address such risks.

The new funds include the Balanced Fund, the 2005 Fund, the 2010 Fund, the 2015 Fund, the 2020 Fund, the 2025 Fund, the 2030 Fund, the 2035 Fund, the 2040 Fund, the 2045 Fund, the 2050 Fund, the 2055 Fund and the 2060 Fund.