Power Your Advice

Matt Berger , Vice President of Client Investment Strategies at  Lincoln Financial , discusses how Lincoln’s Market Intel Exchange helps financial professionals bring clearer market perspective into client conversations. The Market Intel Exchange (MIE) is Lincoln’s monthly, client-friendly market resource, featuring charts and insights designed to help advisors explain timely market events,...

Bassam Chaptini, co-founder and co-CEO of Avantos, discusses the long-running friction around client onboarding, servicing, and relationship management in wealth management. He explains why the problem is less about a lack of tools and more about fragmented systems, disconnected data models, and workflows that force advisors to assemble client context across too many places. Avantos was built arou...

Andrew Okrongly , Director of Modern Portfolios at WisdomTree , examines how capital efficiency can help advisors solve one of the harder diversification questions: not whether to diversify, but what has to be sold to make room for it. Rather than treating alternatives, gold, commodities, or managed futures as trade-offs against core equity and fixed income exposure, Okrongly frames capital-effici...

Andrew Rosenberger , Head of Custom Indexing at  Orion , describes how  Tailored Allocation Portfolios  are designed to bring more personalization into model-based portfolio management without adding unnecessary complexity for advisors. The idea builds on Orion’s custom indexing work, but applies that same optimization mindset to third-party strategist models, tax-sensitive transitions, and portfo...

Karl Roessner , CEO of Vestmark , makes the case that AI’s real promise in wealth management is not just faster workflows, but more time for the work advisors are actually built to do. From meeting prep and proposal generation to portfolio monitoring and client service, he sees agentic AI pushing firms toward a model where advisors can act more quickly, personalize more effectively, and spend less...

Brian Howell , Director of Charitable Consulting at DAFgiving360 , unpacks how donor-advised funds can move charitable giving from a year-end tax decision to a more deliberate part of long-term wealth planning. He walks through the core advantages of DAFs, from contributing appreciated and complex assets to investing for tax-free growth and building succession plans that can simplify charitable le...

Matt Kaufman , Global Head of ETFs at Calamos , breaks down the firm’s new Calamos Autocallable Growth ETF, CAGE, and the role it could play for investors looking to compound assets over time rather than generate current income. He frames the strategy as an extension of the firm’s autocallable lineup, using a laddered index of growth notes with annual observations and a “memory” feature that store...

Danny Lohrfink , Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer at Wealth.com , sees a growing opportunity for advisors to play a more central role in their clients’ financial lives. As expectations rise for more coordinated guidance, he points to estate and tax planning as areas that are becoming more connected to the broader advice relationship rather than sitting off to the side as separate conversations...

Julie Sunwoo , President of DAFgiving360 , outlines why donor-advised funds continue to gain momentum as a flexible, tax-efficient vehicle for charitable giving. By allowing contributions of appreciated assets, immediate tax benefits, and ongoing investment growth before grants are distributed, DAFs help maximize the total dollars ultimately reaching nonprofits. Increasingly, donors are using them...

Ryan VanGorder , CEO of Opto Investments , believes the private markets conversation is changing for advisors. Access may be broader than it once was, but his focus is on what comes next: helping fiduciaries determine where privates fit, evaluate them with more confidence, and bring greater transparency and alignment to the process. In his view, the real opportunity is not access alone, but making...

Ryan Eisenman , co-founder and CEO of Arch , is focused on a problem advisors know well: private markets may be more accessible than ever, but managing them is still highly manual and operationally complex. As RIAs bring more private equity, private credit, venture, real estate, and hedge funds into client portfolios, they are still dealing with subscription documents, capital calls, K-1s, investo...

John Roberts , Chief Field Officer at Northwestern Mutual , shares insights from the firm’s 2026 Planning & Progress Study , pointing to a growing gap in financial confidence—particularly among younger investors. Gen Z and millennials are increasingly turning to speculative behaviors like crypto, sports betting, and prediction markets as a way to “catch up,” often driven by a sense of falling...

Mario Valente , Deputy Chief Investment Officer at Stansberry Asset Management , describes how a boutique, actively managed firm earns the trust of formerly self-directed investors by focusing on low-correlated, idiosyncratic returns. By emphasizing investments that behave independently of broader markets and making tactical shifts across asset classes, the firm has been able to limit drawdowns an...

Alex Laipple , the Chief Growth Officer at Ethic , frames personalization as more than a product feature—it’s a way for advisors to make portfolios actually reflect what clients are trying to achieve. That starts with defining preferences, offering flexible investment structures, and then delivering that final layer of customization around taxes, risk, and individual holdings. When done well—and b...

Josh Rogers , Senior Client Portfolio Manager at Invesco , explains how separately managed accounts (SMAs) have evolved from clunky stock lists into technology-driven portfolio solutions that allow advisors to scale while still delivering meaningful customization. By combining manager-traded portfolios, integrated data systems, and advanced tax management tools, modern SMAs help advisors offer per...

Chris Gannatti , Global Head of Research at  WisdomTree , puts gold’s early-2026 volatility in perspective after one of its strongest years in decades. With roughly a 70% gain in 2025, it’s no surprise the asset class is drawing fresh attention. But the bigger conversation, he suggests, isn’t about last year’s move—it’s about how inflation pressures, rising debt levels, and a shifting geopolitical...

Fred Kaynor , Managing Director at DAFgiving360 , outlines how donor-advised funds continue to play a central role in charitable planning as new tax rules take effect in 2026. He explains how DAFs allow donors to contribute cash or appreciated assets, receive an immediate deduction, and invest funds for potential tax-free growth before granting over time. Strategies like bunching and donating non-...

Tim Seifert , Senior Vice President and Head of Retirement Solutions Distribution at Lincoln Financial , reflects on the lessons of 2025 and what they reveal about the retirement landscape heading into 2026. Seifert points to sustained market demand driven by Peak 65 demographics and heightened uncertainty as key forces reshaping advisor conversations. He explains why protection has moved from a d...

John Connell , Co-Founder and CEO of Focal , outlines how AI can do more than capture notes—it can raise advisor performance. By pairing meeting intelligence with behavioral finance and science-backed coaching, Focal turns compliant client conversations into sharper questions, higher conversion rates, and measurable growth. With more than 130 integrations, the goal isn’t just efficiency—it’s real...

Ritik Malhotra , founder and CEO of Savvy Wealth , explains how automation and AI can strip away the 70% of administrative work that clogs an advisor’s day—compliance, paperwork, data entry, and reporting—so they can focus on what actually matters: clients. By modernizing the middle and back office, Savvy aims to give advisors back time, clarity, and energy—making advice feel more personal, not mo...

Liam Hanlon , Head of Insights at Jump , shares findings from Jump’s first-ever Financial Advisor Insights Report—an analysis of more than 12,000 real advisor-client meetings. Drawing on what Hanlon calls “ground truth data,” the study challenges long-held industry assumptions shaped by traditional surveys, revealing what actually happens inside client conversations. From how much advisors really...

Erin Colledge , Executive Vice President of Platform Unification and AI Strategy at Orion , brings us a grounded view of how AI is being adopted inside advisory firms. As the industry moves past experimentation, Colledge describes a shift toward practical use cases that help advisors prepare for client conversations, understand exposure, and respond more quickly to market changes. The focus is no...

Hans Williams , Head of ETF Strategy at Calamos Investments , joins us  to explore how advisors are approaching Bitcoin exposure in a market where volatility remains a central concern. With drawdowns of 30% or more still defining the asset’s price behavior, Williams explains why the conversation has shifted toward managing downside risk even as interest in digital assets grows. For advisors, this...

Jason Quinn , CFO and COO of Advisor360º , joins us to discuss how wealth management is moving beyond traditional software toward AI-native platforms. Drawing on his experience scaling technology-driven businesses, Quinn explains how the platform is powered by Advisor360º Wealth OS, which connects data, workflows, and applications to support the full advisor experience across firms at different st...

Bryan Sajjadi , a Capital Market Strategist at Fidelity Investments , shares how Fidelity’s privately owned structure and long-term orientation influence the way investment decisions are made. He outlines how the firm’s global research platform—spanning equities, fixed income, sectors, and quantitative analysis—is designed to challenge assumptions, share perspectives, and provide a fuller picture...