Finally, a LinkedIn notification you can actually use.

The world’s largest professional networking platform is rolling out a new feature for premium business subscribers allowing them to offer paid one-to-one advice and career counseling sessions directly from their profile. Dubbed Advice Sessions, the tool appears at the top of the professional’s profile, letting followers press a button to book and pay for the expert’s time without leaving LinkedIn. It’s a seemingly simple feature, according to Derek Notman, founder of Intrepid Wealth Partners, but it could become a game-changer for financial advisors seeking growth through new client connections and peer-to-peer consulting services.

“I was recently given access to the new feature and it’s been great,” Notman told Advisor Upside. “It allows me to offer whatever services I want and get paid for it.”

Growth Is the Game

Having founded his own RIA before the independence movement really took hold, Notman frequently meets with bank and wirehouse advisors who are considering going independent. Typically, these meetings come through referrals or email outreach, but curious advisors are now booking time (and paying meeting fees) through LinkedIn.

Notman expects other financial professionals will offer career counseling, but the most exciting use case for the tool is more effective prospecting that powers faster organic growth. “This feature could be a great way to offer an initial consultation for new clients who already know about your brand through your online presence,” Notman said. “It’s yet another reason why I believe all advisors need to develop their voice on LinkedIn.”

The tool comes at an opportune time for advisors:

• North American wealth managers have enjoyed annual growth rates of about 10% of total assets under management over the past decade, according to recent reporting from the analytics companies PriceMetrix and Crisil Coalition Greenwich.
• But just about 30% of that cumulative AUM growth was organic, with the rest mainly attributable to market performance.

A spokesperson for LinkedIn noted quality controls are in place to ensure a safe experience. “Voices on LinkedIn have long been sharing knowledge,” the person said. “Advice Sessions was built for experts to get paid for what they know and for others to learn from them.”

Portfolio Careers. Another relevant trend, according to LinkedIn, is that more people are building a “portfolio career” with multiple income streams and less reliance on a single service or product that could be jeopardized by shifting market demand or client expectations. It’s a growing trend, especially among Gen Zers, whose early careers have coincided with the rise of gig work, AI and other disruptive forces.

I trade, you trade, E*Trade.

Financial services industry giant Morgan Stanley announced last week that some clients can now buy, sell and hold the cryptocurrencies bitcoin, sol and ether via E*Trade, its self-directed brokerage. They can also view them alongside their stock and ETF purchases. The move is the latest indication that traditional financial institutions are viewing crypto less as a passing trend and more as a permanent part of the investment landscape. The decision was “inevitable,” given crypto’s momentum, said Tyrone Ross, CEO of 401 Financial and Turnqey Labs, even amid the ongoing bitcoin slump.

“It’s a sign of the times,” Ross said. “This is also happening in the depths of a bitcoin and crypto bear market. That part of it is really interesting.”

The Crypto Keeper

Although wirehouses have been slower to incorporate crypto into their mainstream offerings, Morgan Stanley has been at the forefront of tech adoption, Ross said. In April, the firm launched its own spot bitcoin fund, the Morgan Stanley Bitcoin Trust, which overtook the WisdomTree Bitcoin Fund in terms of total net inflows after about a week of trading. But they’re still “woefully behind” the broader crypto industry, he added. As far as transfer capabilities go, the remaining hurdle isn’t so much regulatory as technical, added Roxanna Islam, head of sector and industry research at TMX VettaFi. “Buying and selling crypto is relatively straightforward, but allowing crypto assets to move to and from external accounts introduces significantly more operational and compliance risk,” she said.

Other firms have recently made moves in the crypto space too:

• In April, Charles Schwab announced its new crypto trading platform, Schwab Crypto.
• In February, Fidelity introduced a stablecoin, the Fidelity Digital Dollar Stablecoin (FIDD), meant for trading on its crypto platform.

On the Uptake. The largest uptake will likely come from Morgan Stanley advisors and their clients rather than from average retail investors, who may instead continue to turn to platforms like Robinhood or Coinbase. That could be especially true given E*Trade’s 50-basis-point fee on every transaction. Ross said a majority of the usage wave will “come from the [Morgan Stanley] advisor saying: ‘Go do it at E*Trade. I have no desire to deal with it. Go do it on your own.’”

RIA buyers may be valuing brains over balance sheets.

Mergers and acquisitions in the space remain hot, with 167 deals announced year to date, the most active first half on record, according to DeVoe & Company. But the latest wave of consolidation isn’t just about chasing AUM; many buyers are looking for advisors with expertise in areas like tax planning, retirement and trust and estate services. “We’re much more strategically minded in the acquisitions we’re making, rather than just seeing an AUM number and cash flow number and paying a multiple,” said Haig Ariyan, CEO of Arax Investment Partners.

The M&A playbook may be shifting from a quantity game to a quality one, with firms betting specialized expertise will drive long-term growth.

Welcome to the Crew

The motivation extends to sellers as well. Mid-sized RIAs managing between $500 million and $1 billion in assets often seek buyers that can expand what they offer clients. “For many firms, a key benefit of joining a larger platform is to solve this complex equation,” the report said. “What may take a few years to build internally can often be accessed with the stroke of a pen.”

Ed Mahaffy, founder of ClientFirst Wealth Management with $300 million in managed assets, said he receives at least two acquisition inquiries each week. While he worries some private equity buyers prioritize cost-cutting and eventual resale over client service, he also sees an opportunity for independent firms, especially as his competition gets snapped up by larger firms. “Sometimes [getting acquired] means the little firm can’t provide the service that it used to,” Mahaffy told Advisor Upside. “It’s a lot easier for me to compete against something like that than it is against another firm just like mine that’s willing to go the extra mile.”

RIAs completed 52 acquisitions so far this year, up from 41 during the first half of last year. Arax alone has completed six acquisitions this year, typically adding two to five advisors per deal, with at least two more expected in the coming months. “We’ve seen a lot of high-quality opportunities this year,” Ariyan told Advisor Upside.

Still, RIAs face stiff competition from private equity-backed consolidators that can often outbid them:

• Consolidators have completed 84 acquisitions this year.
• The average seller managed just over $1 billion in assets during the second quarter, with consolidators primarily targeting firms overseeing $1 billion to $5 billion.

You’re Asking How Much? Valuation expectations remain a sticking point. Roughly three-quarters of consolidators say the gap between what sellers expect and buyers are willing to pay is widening. Even so, DeVoe expects dealmaking to remain strong as firms continue to pursue succession plans and greater scale. “Those forces have reshaped the RIA M&A market over the last decade and remain firmly in place today,” the report said.