Family offices and registered investment advisors (RIAs) have long been valuable, but elusive, prospects for fund managers and corporate investors. Traditionally rooted in opaque, relationship-driven networks, this space has been difficult to navigate. FINTRX changes that by delivering powerful data and research that brings transparency to the private wealth landscape. As the family office and RIA ecosystem continues to evolve, FINTRX equips investors with the actionable intelligence they need to stay ahead of the curve and drive meaningful results.
Adam West is the Managing Editor for CardRates, where he routinely corresponds with financial experts to produce the latest news and advice on topics related to helping consumers achieve greater financial literacy and improved credit. He has more than 12 years of storytelling, editing, and design experience in print and online journalism and is most knowledgeable in the areas of credit scores, financial products and services, and the banking industry.
In 2014, a hedge fund client asked investment consultant Russ D’Argento to prospect family offices — or private wealth management firms. But those small firms, which often serve ultra-wealthy clients, operated almost as if they didn’t want to be discovered.
The family office investment space has typically been bound by tradition. For generations, family offices have been private wealth vehicles for ultra high net worth individuals, and families tend to do business mainly on a relationship basis. In other words, accessing decision-makers at family offices was more about who you knew rather than what products you had to offer.
Through his research, D’Argento also realized the space was evolving along with the entire investment landscape. That meant a wide range of alternative providers wanted to reach them, including hedge funds, private equity firms, and real estate funds. Emerging platform technologies also offered an opportunity to bring buyers and sellers together with more precision than ever before.
That emerging dynamic led D’Argento to launch FINTRX, a data provider that conducts research on family offices and the broader financial landscape of registered investment advisors (RIAs). Today, fund managers, investment banks and their startup clients, and even other family offices and RIAs count on FINTRX to help them gain actionable insights and get in touch with those in charge.
"If you were a hedge fund looking to raise money, for example, it was unclear who you needed to target," said Dennis Caulfield, FINTRX Vice President of Research. "FINTRX enables clients to reach decision-makers more efficiently and close deals more effectively."
More than 70% of current single-family offices were established after 2000. With so many new firms, investors need the reporting around proprietary family office data that FINTRX provides. The platform tracks more than $7.6 trillion in total family office assets based on more than 4.8 million data points. Dossiers present info on family background, including wealth creation, investment history, and managed assets.
"We help our clients understand the targeted firm’s transactions, what asset classes are preferred, and what the due diligence, research, and other processes around those investments look like," said Caulfield, who oversees the FINTRX investor research and data team.
The RIA space is similar, but the data FINTRX uses is mainly public. RIA data tracks more than $114 trillion in total investment advisor assets based on more than 6.3 million data points. In addition to reporting investment histories and preferences, RIA data reveals private wealth team structures within firms. That helps managers establish sales territories, report growth metrics, and prepare meeting prep packages.
Both the family office and RIA sides of FINTRX save prospecting time by tracking contact emails, phone numbers and allowing fast access. FINTRX also reveals relationship connections and likely potential associates to ensure productive connections. A client may learn that a prospect attended the same university at the same time, for example, or that the prospect enjoys golf or plays a musical instrument.
"Having that info facilitates a warmer introduction," Caulfield added, "That’s imperative in this who-you-know space."
FINTRX tailors reports to the needs of each client, and it’s accessible via a cloud-based web and mobile-friendly dashboard. Data seamlessly integrates with other platforms through an API feed.
The platform filters out appropriate family offices and RIAs, determines investment history time frames, and identifies contacts with the most potential. Hedge fund managers, private equity or venture capital funds, investment banks, and many other types of asset managers can benefit from that research.
Filters that isolate variables determine allocation preferences. Those include preferred fund types, the existence of separately managed accounts, and whether firms have a progressive investment style or a commitment to sustainability.
A transaction heat map simplifies historical allocation tracking. News alerts and notifications arrive through the app or email on a customized schedule to keep teams informed on personnel changes at critical targets. Updated contact information encompasses more than 800,000+ individual decision-makers and enables clients to reach out across multiple channels.
FINTRX also enhances its view of shared contact commonalities through the Affinity Relatability Score, looking at variables such as resume history, affiliated work, residential locations, professional designations, hobbies and interests, board affiliations, and educational history. It then computes a relatability strength percentage and creates conversation starters around those common aspects.
That process can turn a cold call into an opportunity for a lasting business relationship with the right amount of information.
“We enable our clients to efficiently navigate our data by supplementing fragmented public information with smart tech and algorithms to uncover the best connections.” Caulfield explained.
Characterizing the family office space as opaque is a way of indicating that private wealth firms have traditionally preferred to operate discreetly rather than telegraph their activities. At the start, D’Argento was uncertain whether family firms would contribute their proprietary data to FINTRX.
FINTRX keeps both sides engaged through resources, including a blog devoted to private wealth intelligence and a knowledge center featuring practical private wealth data insights and best practices. FINTRX also partners with Charles Schwab to offer the Family Office Industry Briefing Series, which maps the location and assets of the family office ecosystem.
Client case studies present a wide range of use cases, ranging from local market outreach to extending global investment footprints. As the family office space grows in influence as a source of capital for alternatives, the diligent, service-oriented FINTRX research team ensures its data stays current. FINTRX is now the preferred source of family office and RIA data for the alternatives industry — for small firms with targeted strategies and large ones with multiple goals.
"It applies across all asset classes. If you’re targeting a space that’s in the shadows, as family offices are, personal networks are limited, and web searches are taxing at best." Caulfield said. “Unless you’re using FINTRX, you’re a step behind."