Caitlin Douglas, a new founding partner and chief operating officer for investment firm Elevation Point, knows the industry's next few years will be defined by advisers seeking “different flavors of independence.” She is sure that her firm has found a fragrance that will be particularly attractive.
“You have (on the one hand) your platforms that are service providers, and then on the other hand, you have your aggregators, which require you to give up full control,” she said. “In the middle is where you have the Elevation Point. We don't want you to give up full control.”
Douglas joined Elevation Point in September from her previous job as managing director of transition services and co-head of service at Dynasty Financial Partners, where she stayed for six years.
Prior to that, she was director of client services at Columbia, Md.-based RIA Keeney Financial Group. (which was purchased by Beacon Pointe). At Elevation Point, she will lead the firm's operations and service organizations.
Sanctuary Wealth founder and former CEO Jim Dickson launched Elevation Point in June with co-founder Mark Penske, founder and chairman of financial services holding company United Atlantic Capital.
The firm will take minority stakes in RIAs with assets ranging from $200 million to $3 billion and contribute resources to help them grow. At the firm's launch, Elevation Point acquired RIA Mount Yale Capital Group for $3.4 billion, which would create middle- and back-office business functions for future advisers.
In addition to Douglas, Elevation Point also brought in former UBS executives Bradford Smithy and Robert B. Tamarkin as founding partners, former Summit executive Jenna Bloomgarden as head of marketing and advisory experience and former BNY Pershing executive Brian Terraciano as head of operations.
Douglas said the firm will add someone in-house to provide high-end estate and tax planning services to firms early next year; the firm aims to onboard at least one to two teams per month over the next year.
According to Douglas, firms seeking independence have far more choices than they did 10 years ago. She recalled her time at Keeney Financial, when the LPL-affiliated firm began exploring opportunities to become independent. She recalled that it took her and the firm's president years to do their due diligence and understand the indie landscape.
“But what it really comes down to is you own your RIA, and that's it. If you wanted to go into a corporate ADV, it used to be like you were going into a corporate ADV at LPL or something like that, not the choice you have now where you can be with Elevation Point,” she said. “I mean, the options they've just grown exponentially.”
Technology is accelerating the pace of change. According to Douglas, just five years ago, paper transfers of customer accounts in new businesses were the norm. Now, firms are onboarding clients digitally, reducing transitions that could have taken months or weeks to shorter and shorter periods of time, depending on the custodian.
“Instead of it taking weeks to create complex accounts and entities, it's more like you're looking at days… if not a day,” she said. “And we're already starting to see that in some respects.”