The firm has gone live with a digital wealth advisory offering in the US.

UBS Wealth Management USA has gone live with its robo-advisor platform, designed with San Francisco-based fintech SigFig and part of a trend of such digital offerings in the sector.

The platform is being made available to clients of the UBS Wealth Advice Center. 

Known as UBS Advice Advantage, the platform offers portfolio diagnostics, goals tracking features and access to a new investment advisory product, the UBS Advice Portfolio Program. All clients will continue to have access to financial advisors at the UBS Wealth Advice Center.

With wealth managers concerned that “Big tech” could grab a share of the pie, the private client industry has been rolling out digital offerings in a bid to retain and win new clients, such as younger adults said to be more at ease with tech-driven offerings. Fears about the impact of tech upstarts are not universally shared, however. (See a recent report here.)

“We saw an opportunity to enhance the advisor-client relationship with an innovative product that meets our clients’ needs and maintains the critical elements and trust we have cultivated over decades," Rich Steinmeier, head of digital strategy and platforms at UBS Wealth Management USA, said.

The new offering lets clients get UBS analytics on accounts they have at other financial institutions, giving them a wider view of their affairs.

The new online investment advisory product, the UBS Advice Portfolio Program, features risk assessment, online enrollment, regular monitoring for rebalancing, tax loss harvesting functionality, and ongoing professional portfolio management aligned with UBS GWM CIO capital markets assumptions. All of the portfolio diagnostics services are complimentary. The advisory program has a minimum investment of $10,000 with an advisory fee of 0.75 per cent of invested assets.

“Technology is changing how people invest and playing a critical role in how financial institutions are improving the overall client experience,” Mike Sha, CEO of SigFig, said. (SigFig, founded in 2007, is backed by venture capital firms including Bain Capital Ventures, Union Square Ventures, DCM, and Nyca Partners.)

As regulatory costs mount and with some wealth managers raising investment minimums for clients to stay profitable, the move towards forms of tech-driven business models have in part been an attempt to continue catering to clients "orphaned" by pricing changes. The adoption of "robos" may also reflect a degree of commodization of the wealth space, particularly at the mass-affluent/lower HNW end of the spectrum.