Alice Ross of the FT says “The point of robo-advice was originally to give people who might not otherwise be able to afford financial advice some sort of steer at a lower cost to the banks and other providers. All the high street banks — including HSBC, NatWest and Santander — are busy launching some form of robo-advice. But it turns out higher-net worth types quite fancy the idea as well.”

There are so many issues here…Robo advice is not really the right terminology but its stuck with us for the moment. Whilst the investment industry needs to embrace this technology faster, the question arises….Do most people want to talk to someone? In my view, yes. But Wealth Managers, Private Banks irrespective of their rhetoric are more interested in telling investors how to invest. Their advice has too many conflicts of interest.

Robo advice should more about reducing the administration of investing rather than finding a silver bullet to outperform. Michael Maslinksi (he’s mentioned in the FT article) is amazed at “…at how long the robo advice revolution has taken. It was pretty obvious to me 20 years ago that a large amount of what a wealth manager does would become automated. I feel that the industry has been pretty slow to respond to the challenges that brings and if it doesn’t respond faster, it will write itself out of history” He’s amazed. So am I. But I do understand why investors are challenged as there are so many investment providers offering what looks like the same thing with different packaging. It’s almost impossible for investors to differentiate. So when investors do see the light, then perhaps investors will be more in the driving seat than they are at present.