Investire | January 2025
2025 will be the year of the recovery of managed savings, the lowering of rates and the liquidity in Italians’ current accounts are a powerful detonator for savings management beyond remunerated accounts and BTPs.
Ten years ago, the world of financial consultancy and private banking celebrated the moment of maximum understanding with asset managers, the number of third-party SGRs with which professionals wanted to work was at its highest.
Each professional could choose more or less freely which fund to offer to their clients from dozens of SGRs with which they had established distribution agreements.
As always happens, the phase of falling in love was followed by a phase of greater lucidity that led to a rationalization of the relationships between distributors and SGRs.
The pressure on the margins of the SGRs, once sumptuous, carried out by distributors has triggered a process of progressive reduction and concentration of the savings management companies themselves.
The phenomenon of delegated management has also become increasingly consolidated, where the distributor delegates the management of its customers’ assets to a third-party manager, while maintaining direct control of the assets under management.
The phenomenon of delegated management has led to a further concentration of operators and to the progressive reduction of the visibility of the asset management companies’ brand for both the financial advisor and the end investor.
The lowering of rates and the search for margins have highlighted that, today more than in the past, the management of Italians’ savings is the real golden goose for banks and financial advisor networks.
Compared to ten years ago, however, almost everything has changed, as demonstrated by recent moves in the banking game: distributors are now aiming to internalize asset management companies by acquiring new ones and consolidating historic ones.
As if that were not enough, in the last few years, new players have appeared on the asset management scene with an increasingly leading role: ETFs.
ETFs have finally found their rebirth thanks above all to advanced and/or paid consultancy: their inclusion in this service model allows the distributor to apply a consultancy fee without affecting the overall efficiency of the portfolio.
Even on the ETF front, large distributors have decided to play an active role, becoming issuers themselves, thus maintaining margins and control of assets internally.
A completely changed scenario for the so-called third-party SGRs, where from protagonists they find themselves supporting actors with the risk of becoming extras, while for the so-called captive SGRs the doors of Olympus could open.
In reality, as always happens, what is happening in the managed savings industry is a natural selection process where the most capable SGRs will survive and will be able to count on above-average managers and representatives.
This is a sector certainly looking for efficiency, performance but also for people who know how to communicate, dialogue and support professionals in their daily work.
The effective contribution that the SGRs and their representatives will be able to give to distributors in converting liquidity into managed savings, perhaps with a focus on equity investments and investments in the real economy, will mark the watershed between those who will play a leading role in the coming years.
Nicola Ronchetti