Mattioli Woods is to launch a new product, MW Select, a simple vehicle that will allow clients to access to its discretionary fund management services in a more cost effective way than a pure self-invested personal pension would allow.
Speaking to FTAdviser, the firm’s sales and marketing director Murray Smith explained this the new product allows someone in a group personal pension with a very simple investment offering to move that into a more proactively managed fund.
“Discretionary fund management for me is the most efficient way of running money, particularly if you are invested into real and volatile assets like the equity market, so it’s just given a little bit more of a robust investment solution for those that understand it.
The product will launch over the next two to four weeks, with Mr Smith noting that at this stage MW Select was “an internal product” but that there were 30-50 clients “waiting in the wings” for it, with around 250 new clients to be written by the end of the year.
“As a business we have 6,000 clients and we kind of annualise bringing on new clients at around 700 a year.”
The time is right for the product, according to Mr Smith, because the marketplace is changing significantly and this model is in tune with the new landscape.
“We are a business that has always provided its own in house solutions since it was born back in 1991. We feel that distribution in UK financial services is going to change quite rapidly over the next five to ten years.
Mr Smith continued that the firms wants to create a “stronghold” of the traditional IFA and provider relationship, “where IFAs did have quite a lot of sway on the design and the creation of the product that traditional providers would provide”.
He said that providers are starting to go direct to consumer rather than go through intermediaries, while the likes of Standard Life acquire advisory businesses.
“We believe the man from the Pru is on his way back, so what we are maybe seeing is a real shift, that businesses will go direct to consumer and therefore the ability for advisers to potentially create suitable products in conjunction with providers for their clients might become a challenge.
“So it’s almost a strategic step from our perspective, if we are not providing our own solutions then we are not reliant on anyone else for that, which I think is quite critical.”
ruth.gillbe@ft.com
