The second day of Wealth Management EDGE on Wednesday included a series of firsts.
The first-ever kayak outing, game show, speed painter, headshot booth, InvestTours and more.
Still, some of the most popular parts of the conference continued this year as well: Tech Tours and demos, RIA Edge 100 wine tasting, next-gen meet up, mentor speed dating and ice cream in the expo hall.
In between all the fun and games, the likes of Focus Financial CEO Michael Nathanson, Rise Growth Partners founder Joe Duran, TradePMR President and CEO Robb Baldwin and others took the stage in front of an audience of 1,600 attendees, including 1,000 financial advisors, at The Boca Raton resort in Boca Raton, Fla.
Nathanson talked about “interdependence” and how the industry has changed.
“We have moved from a period of fierce independence, which was effectively a reaction to wirehouses and suitability and people looking to get closer to clients, into interdependence,” he said. “Now we can embrace the best part of independence but also the benefits of working together.”
Duran and the industry’s self-proclaimed nerd, Michael Kitces, participated in a “Financial Feud” game show where they debated topics such as private equity, succession planning and the value of a brand.
The duo disagreed on most of the topics, but did agree that the current custodial model is broken and has huge fiduciary issues.
Kitces said that it was an advisor’s job to minimize conflicts of interest, and the current structure does not allow that, while Duran urged advisors to be thoughtful about the multi-custodial model.
View the following gallery for more scenes from Day 2 at Wealth Management EDGE.