RIAs

Advisors with at least some technology integration can perform a whole lot better than RIAs with none, according to a report from Aite Group, the Boston-based research and consulting company.

First Allied Holdings, an independent broker-dealer, is set to be acquired by RCAP Holdings.

With the passing of Dodd-Frank, the SEC is paving the the way to adopt a uniform fiduciary standard for broker/dealers and investment advisors. Barry Glassman of Glassman Wealth says that there's no feasible way for brokers to uphold the same fiduciary standard to which RIA are held. He writes, "for them to come under the fiduciary standard as it currently exists, their businesses would have to split up into so many micro pieces that it would be disastrous for them." But the alternative, as it is being proposed, is for the very meaning of the fiduciary standard to change.

John Hancock Financial Network is picking up another 280 registered representatives?with the acquisition of Symetra Investment Services.

Fidelity Institutional Wealth Services introduced a platform that it hopes will make mergers and acquisitions easier for registered investments advisors.

When you launch your own RIA everything matters. Even the color pink.

Commonwealth Financial Network, the nation’s largest privately held independent broker-dealer, named Rich Hunter president and chief operating officer on Friday and also announced new affiliation models for its nearly 1,500 financial advisors.

Advisors are wary of BNY Mellon's plan to provide private banking services to RIAs.

Art Tambaro, president and CEO of Royal Alliance Associates, (left) one of four independent broker-dealers owned by AIG’s Advisor Group, will retire at the end of the year. He will be replaced by Dmitry Goldin, a member of Royal’s senior leadership team for the last decade.

“There’s a huge shift this year from last year in overall optimism from the advisors,” says Mark Schoenbeck, senior vice president of marketing for Curian Capital, the asset management firm that conducted the 2013 Curian Capital Survey. “It was a pretty big swing.”