More Than Just Custody: How Altruist Gives Advisors the Competitive Tech Edge

Dave Nadig caught up with Dasarte Yarnway, Head of Community at Altriuist, at Future Proof to talk technology, community, and modern custodianship.

Transcript

Opening: On Building Community

Nadig: So, explain the cult to me then. I know a lot of Altruist advisors, and they are a community in a way that a lot of people who say community don't actually make community happen. How do you build community?

Yarnway: You build community by listening, right? We're listening to our advisors, we're listening about what they need, right? We're listening about the tools that they want – we're trying to build those in real time. So I think to build community, you have to invite people to the table.

More Than Just a Modern Custodian

Nadig: Dasarte Yarnway, Head of Community at Altruist. I'm a big fan of Altruist for a couple of reasons, but more than anything, you guys have kind of reinvented the relationship between a service provider and the advisor themselves. Talk a little bit about how you see yourself positioned amongst all these players here. We got Schwab here, we got Fidelity, everybody's here. You guys are different.

Yarnway: Well, first of all, we're the only modern custodian built to help clients serve their clients easier, cheaper, and faster, right? And I think one of the things that we do is we start with the advisors. We listen to our advisors and we try to build for what they need to do their best work for their clients.

Nadig: But you do a lot more than just custody, right? Under the umbrella, I've seen you guys launch things like direct indexing, model portfolios, tax software. How do you patch all that together? Because you guys are also known for being pretty darn cheap compared to your competitors.

Yarnway: Well, first of all, engineering and technology, right? We think that technology and where the puck is going is where we want to be, and we want to be futuristic and building the tools that allow advisors to do their work more efficiently and faster, as I said before.

Nadig: How do you relate to the investment management community that's here? I mean, you guys are a self-clearing custodian, right? So all the trades actually go through you all. There's been a lot of hubbub in the industry about who's charging what, Fidelity charging this, Schwab charging that. You guys are kind of just “ETFs are free”, right?

Yarnway: Yeah, we want to be cheaper, but it's not only about being cheaper. It's about creating a delightful product that both the advisors and the clients can enjoy, a place that's safe, a place that advisors can do their best work, and a place that clients feel like is working for them. And I think that Jason and the entire engineering team has built something that advisors have taken to their clients and they love.

How Altruist Makes Room at the Table for Advisors

Nadig: So, explain the cult to me then, because I know a lot of Altruist advisors, and they are a community in a way that a lot of people who say community don't actually make community happen. What's the trick there? I mean, are you guys running giant events and getting everybody to go out to dinner? How do you build community?

Yarnway: You build community by listening, right? We're listening to our advisors, we're listening about what they need, right? We're listening about the tools that they want. We're trying to build those in real time.

So I think to build community, you have to invite people to the table. And I think Jason Wenk and the entire executive team have done that through our Altruist Academies, through the podcast and sharing stories about how to build firms and grow and scale. And I think with our technology paired with listening to essentially our business partners – which are advisors – you build a community that is growing really rapidly.

Nadig: Now, a lot of folks when they get into this business, you know, we have a lot of younger Millennial advisors here who are just starting to build their book. That can be a really tricky part of building a business because there's all this stuff you don't know. Are you guys set up specifically to help that newer advisor or are you covering the full stack all the way up to a multibillion-dollar RIA that might want to make a move?

Yarnway: You know, I feel like in the beginning, people thought that this was an entry point for beginning advisors or emerging advisors as we like to say, right? But Altruist is built for every advisor at every level, and as we continue to grow, we're building tools that can help your billion-dollar RIAs all the way to the firms that have just got state registration, right?

So we want to be the place that has the technology that's flexible, scalable, can help an advisor build a $100 million firm without hiring a bunch of staff and having staff bloat, right? So I think our technology, our community, right, the tools that we're bringing on and shipping really quickly, help advisors at any level to be more efficient, quicker, and serve their clients, which leads to better outcomes.

Altruist Launches Hazel, an AI Tool for Advisors

Nadig: Awesome. Last question here. What’s cool and exciting? Like what are you guys doing now that's either right on the cusp or you've just launched that you're excited to talk about?

Yarnway: So if you weren't here on Future Proof day one, we announced **Hazel**, which is our **AI tool** that should help advisors be extremely efficient with their practices. Hazel is open to the public. You can sign on for the waitlist, go to **altruist.com/hazel**, and try it out, right? Because we want to make sure that advisors can have the technology, do their best work, serve their clients, and have better outcomes.

Nadig: Awesome. Well, thanks so much for joining us.

Yarnway: Thanks so much.