Milwaukee-based Capital Market Consultants (CMC) LLC, is expanding its reach into the financial management market with two new online products for members. CMC, located at 217 N. Broadway, provides custom open architecture investment management platforms, consulting and investment advisory services to small and mid-sized financial organizations.
CMC launched its fourth and fifth Web-based investment analysis applications in April to add value and information to its clients, said Barry Mendelson, managing partner of CMC.
CMC’s clients are mostly banks, law firms and registered investment advisors (RIAs) including wealth management firms, accounting firms, independent consultants and independent brokers.
The clients rely on CMC to provide them with financial management advice, due diligence, information on asset allocation and marketing products. The Web-based programs allow clients to sift through data libraries and subscribe to monthly reports that analyze specific asset allocations pertaining to their business, Mendelson said.
"There is a drive in the financial services business toward the affluent client, or wealth management, and having access to information in an easy-to-use chart form helps (investment professionals) differentiate themselves from the competition," Mendelson said. "They look smart and in control."
The newly launched products are CMC RBSA (Returns Based Style Analysis) Reports and CMC HBSA (Holdings Based Style Attribution) Reports. The monthly reports are subscription-based and available to CMC clients to use for their own analysis or as marketing pieces in newsletters to their clients.
CMC RBSA reports focus on the pattern of return on an investment and the short, medium and long-term style and consistency of a fund. CMC HBSA reports look at portfolio composition to evaluate and draw conclusions on its performance, including which aspects add and detract from the overall return. Financial professionals receive a detailed analysis of the asset allocation once requested.
The HBSA service is provided by Stoktrib performance attribution software from Santa Clemente, Calif.-based PPCA Inc.
"The online products represent a small part of our business but grew out of a business need to serve clients," Mendelson said. "Clients would ask us for various types of research including graphs and back tests on certain investment strategies. With the online products we can give far more to our clients than they may occasionally ask for and out of the original motivation grew a number of online products."
The other subscription-based online tools include CMC EResearch, an online product chart and table library with more than 600 charts updated monthly; CMC PASS (Performance Assessment & Style Score) Reports, mutual fund performance and style analysis reports and QualSearch, a money manager database that provides information on firms including background, white papers, staff biographies and government filings.
The data and information CMC offers through the online products serve as a reference tool to clients. Investment professionals can view how different investment strategies work month by month and can use the information to educate their own clients on the investment process and strategies, Mendelson said.
CMC offers similar services with its open architecture where it acts as the chief investment officer for independent financial professionals by providing resources and assets that clients can use instead of having to invest in employees, software and licensing, travel, research and an allocation department, Mendelson said.
"We can provide a set of assets, resources, knowledge and expertise that they can harness to build something proprietary and to themselves," Mendelson said. "They can do this themselves and spent a lot of money for an uncertain outcome versus outsource to a firm like ours who will build it for them to be owned by them, it will be state of the art and help them compete against the big guys."
