If 2025 was the year AI dominated the headlines, this year it’s dominating market share.

Across wealth management, firms are deploying the technology to streamline operations, improve client engagement and bring down costs. New AI tools have literally moved markets. Generative AI alone could add some $340 billion in annual value to the banking sector, and wealth managers are expecting productivity gains of more than 30%, McKinsey estimates. The tools are already summarizing client meetings, drafting emails, scanning documents and helping surface planning opportunities that firms might have otherwise missed. Now, the question on everyone’s mind is: what comes next?

“What’s important is to rethink AI native processes,” said Lauren Wilkinson, CIO of Vanguard Financial Advisor Services. “So, not just AI for assistance around the edges, but really think about how [it] can transform the business, take out the cost, but also deepen relationships and create an even better client experience.”

Triple A … I

There’s a simple framework for understanding artificial intelligence in wealth management, Wilkinson said: assist, augment, action. The first phase is already here with AI adding immediate efficiency gains, particularly in client-facing workflows. That also comes with cost savings. “AI is really offsetting some of the fee compression with advisors by reducing the cost to serve,” Wilkinson said during an interview at the Future Proof Citywide conference in Miami Beach last week.

And, it’s not just Vanguard. According to a survey from the wealth management fintech GReminders released this week:

• More than 88% of advisors said automation directly saved them time, and over 65% of respondents increased client capacity.
• Nearly 70% of advisors reported measurable productivity gains within the first three months of launching AI tools.

Robo Sapiens. The real shift may be yet to come, Wilkinson said. The next stage moves AI closer to core investment and planning decisions. The cyborgs haven’t arrived just yet, however, the final OK must come from humans. “The advisor [is] still the one in control of the judgment,” she said.

The last and final stage is still speculative, but potentially the most transformative. “This is where we talk about agentic AI; agents that will be able to autonomously execute tasks on behalf of advisors,” Wilkinson said. In that future, AI doesn’t just assist or inform, it carries out decisions within defined guardrails, and could reshape the world of wealth management. Until then, at least those follow-up client emails are getting sent out on time, and probably with better grammar.

Here’s a little something extra for you.

GeoWealth, a turnkey asset management platform, announced a $42.5 million investment from Goldman Sachs, bringing its total Series C funding round to $80.5 million. The Wall Street investment bank joins groups including Apollo, BlackRock, JPMorgan Asset Management and Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors as a minority investor. The two firms first partnered in October 2024 to further develop custom model portfolios for advisors on GeoWealth’s platform.

While this kind of funding usually goes toward acquisitions or expanding services, in this particular case, the majority of the Goldman funds will instead provide liquidity to early shareholders, said Colin Falls, GeoWealth CEO. “This wasn’t us going out, trying to find additional capital,” he told Advisor Upside. “It was more of an expansion of that relationship [with Goldman].”

Stand Out

The TAMP space is largely dominated by big companies like AssetMark and Envestnet, which have been purchased by massive private equity firms in recent years, GTCR and Bain Capital, respectively. Falls sees this latest funding as a testament to GeoWealth’s place in an industry where a business can easily be overshadowed by bigger players.

“If you broadly look across the TAMP industry, you have the big incumbents that were public and have all gone private now,” Falls said. “A lot have gobbled up what I consider subscale, niche TAMPs, and there are very few intermediate companies that have proven they can establish a market fit.”

Tech Stack Talk. Right now, Falls believes advisors are often stuck between two options when it comes to managing their tech stacks: pure DIY software-as-a-service or outsourcing to a TAMP that takes over the entire investment process. “That’s what often gets lost in this conversation: A TAMP is not just the tech, but it’s the professional services support,” he said. “I think the void we filled in the industry is being hybrid of a software-first, self-service platform that still has all of the scale and efficiencies that would be gained from a TAMP.

“If I was building an RIA today, I would not want to build that infrastructure in house.”

Can we change the subject?

Some 83% of Americans say they’re comfortable talking about money with at least one person. However, most remain silent when it comes to admitting financial struggles to the people closest to them, which can ultimately lead to plenty of relationship strains, according to a new report from the CFP Board. “Too many Americans are carrying financial stress alone,” K. Dane Snowden, CFP Board CEO, said in a statement. “That quiet burden can affect relationships, confidence and the ability to fully show up.”

While advised clients are less likely to deal with financial strain than the DIY crowd, wealth managers are paramount in helping clients navigate money conversations with their loved ones. “The important thing to understand in these discussions is how to frame questions that open clients up, or at least give clues in body language or tone of underlying issues,” said Andrew Fincher, a CFP with VLP Financial Advisors. Any deviation from financial goals including significant cash flow deficits can open the door to understanding tensions or omission of financial struggles, he told Advisor Upside.

The Root of Problems

Some Americans choose to be homebodies, (are you binging the new season of The Pitt on HBO, too?) but others feel stuck at home because of their financial situations.

The CFP Board report found:

• Just over two-thirds of people have declined social events in the past two years primarily due to costs.
• Some 30% turned down trips with friends, 23% missed family holiday gatherings and 13% have skipped weddings to save money.

More than half never told their loved ones the real reason why they’ve missed important life events.

Let’s Chit Chat. Even when people try to have uncomfortable, honest conversations about money with their loved ones, things can go south pretty easily without a professional advisor. About 30% of Americans said the conversations significantly strengthened a relationship, while 12% said it actually made things worse, the report found.

“Some money taboos are cultural rather than generational, meaning they won’t disappear on their own,” Kevin Roth, managing director of research at CFP Board, said in a statement. “Comfort discussing money doesn’t guarantee skill in navigating these conversations.” He added that professional financial guidance can provide the structure, neutrality and long-term perspective to help turn potential conflict and uncertainty into productive planning that strengthens relationships.