Advisor-friendly trust services for investment advisors

Today’s investment advisors face uncertain industry dynamics that can threaten their business – from an aging client base to a shifting economic landscape. At the same time, research shows that high net worth families are growing weary of the inflexibility, turnover and high fees charged by large institutional banks.

In response, many savvy investment firms have benefited by forging a solid alliance with an advisor-friendly trust administration company that understands their challenges.

At Sterling Trustees, we collaborate with prominent investment advisors to safeguard their business and their clients’ interests. Our team helps ensure that a family’s legacy continues under their advisor’s watchful eye, while growing the investment firm’s client roster as assets pass to the next generation.

Facts that can add risk to the investment advisors’ business

South Dakota provides for trusts with an unlimited duration. Such trusts allow for continued creditor and ex-spouse protection for beneficiaries in perpetuity. Additionally, they enable family members (and their professional advisors) to be involved in traditional roles fulfilled by the trustee through directed or delegated trusts.

• The average advisor is 59 years old – and there aren’t enough new advisors entering the business to monetize their own book when they retire.
• As artificial intelligence and ease of online trading continues to proliferate, the potential need for investment advisors is decreasing.
• When clients reach retirement age with nice nest eggs, advisors must make certain that they’ll manage assets for the next generation.

How the right trust administration firm can protect your business

Our experience tells us that if a client’s assets aren’t in trust when the client dies, the likelihood of holding onto the assets for the next generation is a very low 20%.

Likewise, if assets are in trust, the appointed investment advisor must maintain control – which can prove difficult at a large trust bank, where assets can be poached away by an in-house trust officer.

Let Sterling Trustees, an advisor-friendly trust administration company, help navigate these obstacles.

What you need to know about Sterling Trustees

We are an independent trustee that doesn’t manage assets – which means that you can give clients unbiased trustee service without any inherent conflict of interest. By unbundling financial services, both trustee and advisor can collaborate to provide comprehensive wealth management without any risk of losing control of your relationship or your fees.

Our collaboration is seamless and stress-free. Accounts stay on your platform to simplify the client experience – and if you ever change broker dealers or take your book of business to another firm, we’ll follow you.

Most importantly, as a South Dakota-chartered trust administration company, we offer many advantages – such as no state income or capital gains tax, no rule against perpetuities, asset protection and privacy.

Sterling Trustees allows investment advisors to maintain adequate control when a client dies and not be forced to custody assets away at a large trust bank where assets can potentially be poached away by a trust officer working at the bank.

Talk to us today

Let us begin to show you how we work alongside investment advisors to carefully guide them through a plan to insulate their businesses from the potential impact of their rapidly-aging client base–easy and powerful. Send us an email to get started.