WealthTech Safari March 27, 2026

4 days ago
6 min read

Merrill Launches AI-Powered Meeting Journey

Merrill, a wirehouse giant, launched a tool to automate meeting preparation, summarization, and client follow-ups.
This launch underscores the rapid enterprise-wide adoption of AI to eliminate administrative friction in wealth management.

Knote: Merrill was one of those firms that did not want to deploy notetakers for liability reasons. It looks like the allure of saving thousands of advisor hours finally wore them down.

CurrentClient Secures $1.25 Million Seed Round for Advisor Communication Platform

CurrentClient, a communication startup, secured seed funding to enhance its platform for financial advisor-client engagement.
The investment signals growing venture capital interest in specialized tools that modernize legacy client communication methods.

Knote: It's nice to see a good, old-fashioned VC seed investment in an early-stage company. VC funding has been coming back, but for the <$10mm checks, it is still very slow.

Flanks Launches AI Financial Advisor for Wealth Managers

Flanks, an account aggregator, introduced an AI Financial Advisor designed as an intelligent co-pilot for multi-custodian portfolios.
Automating complex portfolio interrogation via natural language represents a significant shift toward real-time, AI-driven advisory support.

Knote: There isn't much of a moat around AI tools these days, except one: data. So it makes sense that one of Europe's largest portfolio aggregation companies would field an AI overlay.

Corebridge Financial and Equitable Holdings Announce Transformational Merger

Corebridge Financial and Equitable, two insurance giants, have announced a merger to scale their retirement and wealth capabilities.
This massive consolidation highlights the ongoing trend of "Peak 65" driving strategic mergers to capture retirement income market share.

Knote: It's not WealthTech per se, but will likely shake-up the tech stack over the next 24 months, so heads up.

Fundment Tops Defaqto 2026 Platform Service Ratings in Adviser Survey (UK)

Fundment, a UK-based AdvisorOS, outranked established competitors to secure the top spot in the 2026 Defaqto ratings.
The success of specialist providers suggests that service quality and modern technology are becoming primary differentiators over legacy brand heritage.

Knote: Fundment has come from nowhere to rocket to the top slot with a modern platform that we would say is easy, functional, and importantly, when you turn it on it just plain works. US legacy platforms should take note.

iCapital and Aladdin Wealth Partner to Bring Alternatives into the Core Advisor Portfolio

iCapital and Aladdin Wealth, an analytics platform, partnered to integrate private market assets into standard advisor workflows.
Bridging the gap between alternatives and traditional portfolios is essential for firms aiming to normalize non-public investments at scale.

Knote: My only real question is "what took them so long?" I will be interested to see how the Aladdin platform handles the analytics around mixed public/private portfolios. That is a gap in the market at the moment, in my opinion.

Cerulli Estimates that US Retail Financial Assets Broke above $100 Trillion in 2025

Cerulli Associates, a research firm, estimated that U.S. households now control over $100 trillion in financial assets.
The explosive growth of mass-affluent wealth demands scalable, technology-led advisory models to capture the expanding middle-market segment.

Knote: Cerulli also estimates that the $100,000 to $2,000,000 segment rose to $25 Trillion and 47 million households. I'm calling that out because it should be of interest to growth-minded advisors as these prospects are more "gettable" than more established households. They note a stat I have not seen before and like: new client engagement drops from 44% for those under 30 to 24% for those over 50.

AssetMark Becomes Latest Firm to Add New Tax Planning Tools

AssetMark, a TAMP provider, added advanced direct indexing and tax-loss harvesting tools to its Adhesion wealth platform.
Rapidly expanding tax-efficient investing capabilities indicates a broader industry focus on delivering personalized, high-value investor outcomes.

Knote: Altruist and Orion also announced tax-optimized investing initiatives in the last few months.

AI-led WealthTech Rising as VCs Bet on a Fintech Disruption (in India)

Indian WealthTech startups, including AI-driven firms, are attracting significant venture capital to modernize middle-income advisory services.
Leveraging the India Stack for AI-powered advisory could create one of the world's most attractive D2C wealth opportunities.

Knote: We continue to believe D2C advice in India to be one of the most attractive WealthTech opportunities globally. The main driver is the massive and rapidly growing mass affluent population, lack of professional advisors, and shift from gold and real estate to financial assets. The AI part is just the cherry on top.

Larry Fink Letter to Shareholders: Alts2Wealth Takeaways

BlackRock, an asset manager, is targeting $400 billion in private market fundraising and major revenue from technology services by 2030.
Integrating private market data into unified platforms signifies a fundamental shift toward making alternatives a core component of retail portfolios.

Knote: In last year's letter, Larry Fink envisioned the 60/40 portfolio moving to a 50/30/20 portfolio with the 20 being alternatives.

Allfunds reports 74% Alternatives growth

Allfunds, a fund platform, reported a 74% increase in alternative assets under administration as demand for private markets accelerates.
Massive growth in the alternatives segment underscores the success of platforms that facilitate friction-free access to non-traditional investments.

Knote: We continue to maintain that TAMPs will be the largest beneficiaries of the Alts2Wealth movement.

GeoWealth Gets $42.5 Million Strategic Investment from Goldman Sachs

GeoWealth, a TAMP firm, received strategic funding from Goldman Sachs to expand its public-private investment infrastructure.
This investment highlights the central role of turnkey platforms in delivering institutional-grade alternatives to the registered investment advisor market.

Knote: It is not surprising that they are targeting some of the proceeds to build out its infrastructure around alternative assets. We believe TAMPs will be the gatekeepers of alternatives in the wealth management channel. For more on this see https://www.wealthtechstrategy.com/post/tamps-the-tip-of-the-alts2wealth-spear

Quorus Secures $5 Million To Scale Tax-Managed Infrastructure

Quorus, an infrastructure provider, raised seed capital to scale its automated tax-loss harvesting and personalized portfolio tools.
Democratizing family-office-level tax optimization reflects a shift toward holistic advice focused on the center of a client's financial life.

iCapital Acquires Hexure to Expand Alternative and Insurance Distribution

iCapital, an alternatives platform, acquired Hexure to integrate digital sales automation for insurance and annuities into its infrastructure.
Combining insurance-based structures with private market access creates a more seamless retirement income solution for wealth managers.

MMNote: This hits 2 themes squarely, so I can get behind this investment thesis. 1. Peak 65 is happening right now! Annuity products are key for advice through retirement. 2. Alternatives are the hottest topic right now. Specifically, many private placement annuities allow you to take a decent amount of your gains tax free. Easing the friction will be transformational for investors.

Berlin based Upvest secures $125 million to modernize European investment rails

Upvest, an infrastructure provider, raised funding to modernize legacy banking and investment systems across Europe and the UK.
Providing modular API-first rails allows traditional institutions to launch modern investment products with significantly reduced regulatory and operational overhead.

Knote: The transaction reportedly values Upvest at around $740 million, although that may be thrown off a little by the straight debt component, depending on how they are treating that. Still over a 75% gain from their last round a little over a year ago. Retirement savings in Europe is getting modernized with a rise in technology demand for SIPPs (IRAs) and Altersvorsorgedepot (scarier-sounding IRAs). JP Morgan also recently purchased WealthOS to advance the SIPP market.

Abra to Go Public via Merger with New Providence Acquisition Corp. III

Abra, a digital-asset firm, plans to go public through a $750 million merger with a special purpose acquisition company.
This listing represents the maturation of digital asset wealth management as firms seek capital to scale custodial and trading services.

Envestnet Integrates Interval Funds Directly into its Unified Managed Account Platform

Envestnet, a wealth platform, integrated interval funds into its UMA framework to streamline access to private market strategies.
Automating the subscription and redemption lifecycle for interval funds removes major operational barriers to democratizing institutional-grade investments.

Knote: Interval funds seem to be the gateway drug for alternatives these days and a safe way for Envestnet to dip its toe in the water. AssetMark is doing the same. There is some tech lift involved, for example incorporating the redemption window, but otherwise fits neatly into existing architecture.

JIFFYAI Launches AI Advisor Companion

JIFFYAI, is an AI firm, launched a tool to automate advisor meeting preparation, scheduling, and follow-up documentation.
The rapid evolution of AI advisor assistants highlights the competitive battle to own the "last mile" of advisor productivity.

Knote: The competition in the AI advisor assistant space continues to heat up. They are rapidly evolving and adding functionality. We have renamed this sub-sector from "Workflow Support" to "Notetaker" to "Meeting Management" and now "AI Advisor Assistant" all within the last 9 months.