Recently I was contemplating how many investment platforms and tools I have used over the years managing money as a portfolio manager. Most professional money managers have a pretty hefty budget to allocate toward research, and in particular systems to help them do the research to determine what specific securities to invest in. One of the more expensive, but certainly ubiquitous, is the Bloomberg terminal, which made Michael Bloomberg a billionaire– sixty times over. The Bloomberg terminal costs $2,000 per month and apparently there are roughly 325,000 separate users worldwide. The reality is that virtually none of those users comes close to utilizing all the functionality that Bloomberg has. Most users garner just a few specifics from the platform, whether it is to look up data on US stocks, occasionally look at some economic data, check out the price of oil or gold, or even look up whether there is a direct flight from Boston to Caracas. The analogy is that most users of many things don’t actually utilize the limits of the majority of things they own. The guy you see driving the Ferrari probably has not driven it on a track, and has never pushed the car to its limits, unless you count pulling into Whole Foods a little faster than he should as the car’s limit. But whether it’s the Jeep Wrangler that has never actually been off-road, or the Maserati that is capable of 185, but even on the highway doesn’t get driven faster than 85, we all utilize parts of things that we find have utility to us even if we don’t maximize all the capability.
That is also the nature of most software, including PortfolioWise, our new tool for advisors. I find the majority of the time when I log into the system it is to get a quick read of things that are changing on the dashboard:
This is the sector Rating Grid and the Subsector Rankings and it allows me to quickly see that the areas of the market that still look most compelling are Healthcare and the growth areas of Technology and Communications. Although oil seems to have finally stabilized, and Energy stocks have bounced back from very depressed levels, from both a fundamental and technical perspective investing in Energy ETFs is not an area I would try yet as the XLE is still very bearish in our system. Conversely, the XBI the Biotech subsector looks compelling and so I took a look at it a little deeper.
What I enjoy about using the platform is that even though I realize there are even more complex levels of functionality, I can still quickly find data, performance, cost and other information with just a few clicks. Certainly you are able to build entire portfolios of ETFs in PortfolioWise, and the ETF screener and comparison functions allow you to do a deep research with detailed analysis. Go to the racetrack, so to speak. With the new equity screening functionality you can drill down into very detailed information about specific stocks, even find ETFs that hold those names- drive your Maserati 185; but just as most owners of the Jeep Wrangler spend a whole lot less time on some rocky trail in 4-low than driving on the highway, we set up PortfolioWise for you to monitor and quickly find great information quickly and enjoy your drive.