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How Morgan Stanley’s AI Helped Close 100K New Clients This Year

The investment bank rolled out a suite of AI tools this year and reported almost $64 billion in net new assets in the third quarter alone.

Photo of a Morgan Stanley building
Photo by Michael Vi via iStock

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AI may be your next rainmaker.

Morgan Stanley’s yearslong push to unveil new AI tools is finally helping attract new business and impacting its bottom line. The Wall Street investment bank reported record revenue and profits in its wealth management unit last week, racking up almost $64 billion in new assets in the third quarter alone. For those keeping track, it’s a 76% increase over the previous quarter and an almost 80% jump year-over-year. Executives have said it’s due in large part to new AI tech.

The initiative, called AI @ Morgan Stanley, includes a more efficient prospecting program and a note-taking tool, and is freeing up thousands of hours of time for the firm’s roughly 20,000 advisors. It’s arguably one of the most significant impacts AI has had on wealth management to date. “We understand now how to better match and understand individuals and their needs,” CFO Sharon Yeshaya said during an earnings call last week. “It’s really bearing fruit.” 

Game, Set, Match

Morgan Stanley is using AI to match prospects with advisors through a program the company calls “human referrals.” (We don’t really get the name either.) By handing off prospects from call centers or websites to human advisors, the tool is streamlining what was traditionally a clumsy and ineffective process. So far, the program seems to be working:

  • Successful referrals have now doubled at the firm to over 100,000 year-to-date, Yeshaya said.
  • The AI program is just finding its footing at the firm, and will one day gather insights from ongoing conversations and interactions with prospects that will give employees an edge over competitors, according to CEO Ted Pick. 

Awkward Years. The new tools are part of a larger AI push for some of the country’s largest brokerages. Morgan Stanley finished a rollout of Debrief in June: The software program sits on an advisor’s desktop, records Zoom calls with clients, and drafts follow-up emails. Automating these time-consuming tasks is giving advisors the breathing room they need to bring in new business. Rival JPMorgan Chase unveiled a chatbot earlier this year that can help with writing and summarizing documents, and can be used in place of analysts. 

“Morgan Stanley has been one of the early adopters,” said Sindhu Joseph, CEO of the AI wealthtech company CogniCor. Since the Debrief tool was announced, advisor interest in new tech tools has skyrocketed, she said. “[AI] went from a nice-to-have to a fear-of-missing-out.” 

A Morgan Stanley financial advisor in Houston, cited in a press release, said Debrief freed up about half an hour of time per client meeting. That extra time has helped Morgan Stanley grow client assets to a record $6 trillion. “The industry is going to look very different in the next few years,” Joseph said.