The roadshow, to be attended by more than 1,000 advisers, will feature adventurer Bear Grylls – star of television series Man vs. Wild – as guest speaker. In the next two weeks the roadshow will visit advisers in Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth. 

Infinity was announced late last month as a significant new addition to the award-winning Asgard platform. It will break with the traditional platform model as clients will pay only for the features they use and will target investors with lower balances or specific needs. 

Asgard national product manager Kelly Power said the nationwide launch would showcase the new platform and that Bear was a perfect fit for the launch. 

“Bear is a man who has made it his job to adapt and thrive in whatever situation he literally lands in. That’s what Infinity is all about – helping advisers adapt and thrive in new environments.” 

Infinity to offer low fees
Specialist superannuation research and consultancy firm, Chant West, says Asgard Infinity Core is “cheaper than the top 10 publicly-available Industry Super funds* on a $50,000 account balance.” 

*Top 10 public offer industry funds by superannuation FUA at 30 June 2011. Based on Asgard’s Advance Balanced Multi-Blend option which has 70% growth assets and each industry funds’ multi-manager option with 61-80% growth assets. 

Marketing demo and micro-site
A marketing demo and micro-site is now available for advisers. Advisers can see the demonstration at www.asgard.com.au/infinity

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Infinity eWRAP, which will be available to advisers as soon as next month, will break with the traditional platform model by charging clients only for the features that they use. Advisers will have access to all of the features of a full-featured platform and will have the power to choose the options appropriate for their clients. 

Asgard’s national product manager Kelly Power said Infinity will suit a range of investors and help advisers succeed in the new environment. 

“On Infinity, investors will only pay for the features they use. 

“Infinity is a low-cost investment and super platform suitable for clients with lower balances. It will put advisers in control – giving them the power to choose from the full range of optional platform features such as equities, term deposits and insurance, and as clients’ needs and balances change and evolve they can simply add new options.”

“It’s analogous to Foxtel – where consumers pay for a basic package and then only pay for the specific additional features they use.”

 Ms Power said Infinity will suit investors with specific needs, such as those who are only investing in cash and equities and who do not need or want to pay for a full-featured platform.

“We think this will have particularly strong appeal to the fast-growing self-managed super fund market as it’s suited to the way they invest and also addresses their higher sensitivity to fees. It will also help advisers grow their client base by tapping into other important and growing client segments – such as younger Australians and industry super fund clients.” 

She said Infinity was timely given the significant challenges advisers faced in the new regulatory and commercial environment. 

“Times have changed and we’ve anticipated that. Asgard’s Infinity will allow advisers to adapt and thrive in a commercial and regulatory environment that now demands lower costs and more flexibility, transparency and efficiency.” 

As investors’ needs evolve, they will also be able to seamlessly transfer to Asgard’s fully-featured eWRAP.

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The enhancements include simplified share and managed funds trading, significant enhancements to template (model portfolio) functionality and online corporate actions for eWRAP super and pension accounts.

Head of Asgard, Craig Lawrenson, said Asgard had worked closely with advisers to ensure the changes would result in a simpler, more intuitive and user-friendly trading experience for advisers.

“We continue to invest in the eWRAP platform so that it streamlines portfolio administration and continues to deliver the features and functionality that advisers need to reduce the cost of providing advice.

“We have over $6.2 billion of funds under administration currently using templates, and these new enhancements to our templating functionality will mean advisers can now create templates comprising cash, managed funds and equities which they can link to multiple clients.
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In addition they‟ll now have the added ability to set portfolio preferences at an individual client level to tailor the template to the individual needs of the client.
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“They’ll benefit from greater portfolio administration efficiency, be able to keep clients’ portfolios on track with our automatically-generated rebalance instructions and it’ll be easier to customise templated portfolios to ensure they reflect the needs of different clients. The new features mean clients can be advised individually but where appropriate execution can occur collectively.”
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Mr Lawrenson said enhancements to share trading within eWRAP were particularly timely as the inclusion of equities in portfolios continued to see a resurgence. Simplified share and managed funds trading, and online corporate actions have also been introduced for Asgard’s Managed Profiles platform. Both eWRAP and Managed Profiles are accessed through Asgard’modes award-winning AdviserNET which recently won the “Best Navigation and User Interface‟ award in the 2010 Investment Trends Platform Report.

Details of the enhancements

Simplified share trading.

The new-look trading screen will consolidate the existing buy investments and sell investments screens into a single screen allowing advisers to:

• Buy and sell managed investments and shares for a single client, on the one screen
• Take advantage of real-time trading
• Place trades using pre-settlement sale proceeds
• Have access to market and company research.

Smarter portfolio management.

Advisers will be able to create templates for cash and equities investment leading to more effective and efficient portfolio management. Additionally, advisers will be able to create a combination of portfolio templates. Template preferences will be able to be set depending on individual client need. For example, templates can:

• Include or exclude assets
• Substitute one asset for another
• Lock an asset so it can‟t fall below a limit an adviser nominates
• Specify a minimum trade or holding value before a buy or sell can occur.

Online corporate actions.

Advisers will be able to manage corporate actions online and participate in dividend reinvestment plans.

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