With this release of FirmPlus, we are introducing a Peer Overlay Strategy, along with New Evaluation Criteria, Stylus Report Enhancements, and a few other changes as well. This release also includes New Reporting Options that are now available as well. Check out the details below to learn more.
If you have feedback or ideas for new features for FirmPlus, please send those to Fi360Support@broadridge.com. We would love to hear from you!
New Reports
UBS Select (BOR) Investment Report
The UBS Select (BOR) Investment Report option in FirmPlus provides investment reviews for UBS Select Plans. The UBS Select Report option is intended for approved engagements through the UBS Select program.
To learn how to generate the new UBS Select (BOR) Investment Report, please check out our knowledge base article.
Investment Fee Analysis Report
The Investment Fee Analysis Report option in FirmPlus provides an investment fee breakdown and comparison to asset category averages. This report is great for both clients and prospects to provide a straightforward summary of investment expenses for their investment lineup.
To learn how to generate the new Investment Fee Analysis Report, please check out our knowledge base article.
Lineup Comparison Report
The Lineup Comparison Report option in FirmPlus provides a single report which compares the investment performance and expenses of multiple investment lineups. You can choose to include as few as 2 investment lineups, or as many as 5. This report is great for proposing one or multiple alternative investment lineups to a client or prospect.
To learn how to generate the new Lineup Comparison Report, please check out our knowledge base article
Peer Overlay
FirmPlus will now utilize a Peer Overlay strategy in the formulation of the category peer groups. With the establishment of 6/30 performance data, there will now be a single peer group for each Morningstar Category, consolidating from the six (6) that are currently calculated for each respective Product Type.
The key benefits of this change are to:
- Make performance and fund data more readily obtainable during the quarterly data refresh period
- Allow for expansion with regards to the number of available products late into the update period without impact to scores
- Create a single peer group across product types for size consistency purposes
- Minimize the impact on scoring if "fixing" data is required
In conjunction with the first data release of the quarter, the baseline peer group will be calculated and fixed using the Mutual Fund and ETF product types. Any funds in the additional product types (e.g. CIT, IGSA, Sub-Acct, Separate Accounts) will be overlaid into the fixed peer group allowing the funds to then be scored appropriately and loaded. Whereas previously, Firmplus had to wait for the update of the full product type prior to loading that set of data.
Subsequently, for those users still wanting to report on Product Type, the "Investment within this Report (Advanced Analytics)" section has been updated to now include a product type column.
Additionally, funds that you currently have configured within your plans will automatically be configured into the subsequent category/peer group.
Stable Value Scoring
Scoring for Stable value funds will be disabled in Firmplus. In order to expedite the availability of this category of funds, Stable Value will not be included in the overlay peer groups. Consequentially, Stable Value will not be ranked or scored with the baseline peer group. Firmplus will automatically disable scoring for these funds and scores will not be displayed online or in reports
New Evaluation Criteria
This release of FirmPlus will include the addition of an expanded list of "Rolling" metric evaluation criteria options, as well as an adjustment to a few scoring thresholds options. The addition of these evaluative criterion will allow you to further analyze investment options.
Adding to the already expansive list of available evaluation criteria options, 18 new evaluation criteria and expanded scoring threshold options for 4 existing evaluation criteria have been added to FirmPlus. These new criteria options are available across Active and Target Date Fund scoring. A breakdown of the new evaluation criteria and scoring thresholds can be found below:
NEW Criteria (Active Scoring)
|
Criteria |
Thresholds |
|
Performance |
|
|
3 Year Rolling Excess Performance vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
5 Year Rolling Excess Performance vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
3 year Rolling Annualized Return vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
5 year Rolling Annualized Return vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
Risk Adjusted Return |
|
|
3 year Rolling Alpha |
>0 |
|
5 year Rolling Alpha |
>0 |
|
3 year Rolling Alpha vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
5 year Rolling Alpha vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
3 Year Rolling Sharpe Ratio vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
5 Year Rolling Sharpe Ratio vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
3 Year Rolling Information Ratio vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
5 Year Rolling Information Ratio vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
Volatility |
|
|
3 year Rolling Beta |
<1.2, 1.0, 0.9, 0.8 |
|
5 year Rolling Beta |
<1.2, 1.0, 0.9, 0.8 |
|
3 year Rolling Beta vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
5 year Rolling Beta vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
Downside Protection |
|
|
3 Year Rolling Sortino Ratio vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
|
5 Year Rolling Sortino Ratio vs. peers |
in top 75%, 50%, 25%, 10% |
NEW Criteria (Target Date Scoring)
|
Criteria |
|
Performance |
|
3 year Rolling Annualized Return |
|
5 year Rolling Annualized Return |
|
Risk Adjusted Return |
|
3 year Rolling Alpha |
|
5 year Rolling Alpha |
|
Volatility |
|
3 year Rolling Beta |
|
5 year Rolling Beta |
NEW Thresholds to Existing ACTIVE & PASSIVE Criteria
|
Criteria |
Thresholds |
|
Fund Characteristics |
|
|
Manager Tenure |
> 4 years |
|
Performance |
|
|
3 year Annualized Return |
in top 30% |
|
5 year Annualized Return |
in top 30% |
|
10 year Annualized Return |
in top 30% |
Stylus Report Enhancements
We have made several enhancements to the Stylus report sections labeled as "Advanced Analytics" in order to improve consistency within Firmplus reporting section styling. The use of table styles, fonts, and missing data nomenclature are some examples of improved standardization. These enhancements further integrate the two reporting sources to create an improved, seamless report output.