Simon Bottle – Robo Advice

1. Robo-Advice – Putting Top Quality Investment Portfolios Within Reach Of Us All Robo-advice Becomes Mainstream In recent times, it has been virtually impossible to read a financial section of a newspaper or website without an article or two covering ‘Robo advice’. Robo-advice provides the man in the street with the opportunity to invest in an institutional quality diversified portfolio which only a few years ago would have been impossible to obtain due to the costs involved. Using a simple web-based approach, based on answering questions that are easy to understand in everyday language, the investor goes through an online process designed to determine their individual investment needs and aspirations. This process can take a matter of minutes and generates a proposal to invest in one of the risk rated portfolios that the fund manager who runs the robo-advice service has built and maintains. Why Do We Need Robo-advisers? A very high % of personal investors decide for themselves how to invest at least some of their own hard earned cash. This is somewhat of a high-wire tightrope act given the risks involved even for those with investment experience and it sucks up a lot of precious time too. The alternative historically has been engaging the services of an IFA but post RDR, the costs for those with a smaller nest egg has made this an unreachable goal. This often results in no investments being made at all which in turn makes it very difficult to reach desired investment objectives. Robo-advice provides the opportunity for those who cannot afford investment expertise from elsewhere to get the support they require. It is this characteristic of robo-advice that the regulators are so keen on. More Robo-adviser Blogs To Follow Lots more to come on the rise and rise of Robo-advice, the strengths to look for in a quality provider plus a whole lot more on the space.