Recommendations on Portfolio Accounting Software?

bchadwick, how large is your RIA? Fortigent provides an even more outsourced solution if you doing a lot of alts.
 
Thanks!
Unit.Root. We’re still a startup, so some family and friends with capital, plus partners (as someone who started life as an academic, my capital is sweat equity). My partner is a former prop trader who ran a global macro fund for about a decade until the 2008 crisis. I’ve been working with him since 2009 on developing a better portfolio construction methodology that basically blends tactical asset allocation approaches with more traditional discretionary macro trading.
We’ve got a good product, but we need better back office systems in order to scale up and pass any reasonable due diligence. We can do it, but there’s not a lot of cash flow to fund it just yet.
I looked at Fortigent after you mentioned it: it looks like it’s more geared to fund of funds, or am I missing something? We definitely want to be able to track our holdings, do attribution and performance analysis without having to do everything by hand (or excel), and be able to scale to separately managed accounts. We need to handle ETFs, Futures, Options on ETFs and Futures, and Spot FX.
 
The.Unit.Root - Appreciate sharing your thoughts. Starting at new job in Investment management and this will be one of the first projects I need to lead, helping the partners implement BD. So will have tons of questions once I start. If you have an email great. I can be reached at sachinkm at yahoo.
 
Hold that thought BChad. I just received this email from BD. Apparently they’re being sold to Advent…
“Our Path to Greatness
When I founded Black Diamond in 2003, it was based on the premise of helping advisors be great. In the eight years since, we have learned, grown and evolved, but our plan to be a great partner for advisors has never changed. We strive to be a highly valued, trusted partner of our clients by providing the best portfolio accounting and performance reporting solutions with the best people and the best service. Since bringing the platform to market in late 2005, we have grown our client base to 280 firms representing $75B in AUM and nearly 200,000 accounts. During this time, we have continually searched for ways to increase our positive impact on our clients, our culture and our community.
Today, I am excited to announce that we have signed a definitive agreement to be acquired by Advent Software, the pioneer and leader in the financial software space. Advent has long been a company I have admired for its transformative impact on the industry and now global reach. However, when we were first approached by them about working together, we had questions about how Advent viewed the marketplace and what they were looking to provide advisors. The things we learned were striking. From my very first conversation with them it was clear that Advent’s leadership team is focused on doing the right things and delighting its clients. Based on this, we wanted to dig deeper and here’s what we found:
1. They have great people, extremely similar values and even similar beginnings.
2. They recognize the value of our platform and its power to help a practice grow, scale and attract new business.
3. Combining our efforts is the right solution for the advisory market and will leverage both companies’ strengths to provide the best solution possible.
Personally, I see this as a chance for Black Diamond to take a big leap forward and am more excited than ever to continue the mission we started. Advent is looking to us to continue innovating and enhancing our platform, to develop for next generation devices and to further strengthen our culture of service and high performance for our clients. Black Diamond will remain an independent business group highly focused on the needs of the advisor. I will be leading the advisory strategy for Advent with the same values and principles that make Black Diamond what it is today – do the right things for the right reasons, the right way. Combining with Advent represents the opportunity to do more for advisors and accelerate our pace of innovation.
Black Diamond exists to cultivate greatness for our advisors and that will not change. Both Advent and Black Diamond are committed to a seamless transition and emerging as a stronger, more agile solution for our advisors. This combination represents the next chapter in supporting advisors on their path to greatness and I am excited to take the next step.
Reed Colley
CEO and Founder
For more information and to view a copy of the Press Release, visit www.blackdiamondreporting.com
 
Ahhh Advent. Somebody comes up with a superior product? Buy them. My first PMS was Portfolio 2000 back in 2000. Great windows-based product vastly superior to Advent’s. And Advent knew it. So they bought them with the promise they would continue supporting the product. Well, that lasted about 12 months and adios Portfolio 2000.
We use Advent here (small cap, long-only shop) and if I could start from scratch, I would tell Advent to take a hike. But the back office is comfortable with the product so we take it in the arse every year and re-up with them. That includes their CRM Qube (which they inform us they are getting rid of - thanks guys) and Moxy, their trading software.
 
I’m trying out the M* Office software, really looks very good for the research/PM part, don’t know about accounting yet.
 
Bchad, just re-read your first post, you’re right on fortigent being more geared towards FoF.
Astute, email is [email protected]
Here’s the latest communication on BD from Advent:
Dear Black Diamond Clients,
When we named Advent almost 30 years ago, we took two of our favorite words – adventure and invent – and melded them because they best captured the spirit of building a business at the intersection of finance and technology. The adventure certainly continues today with the excitement we all feel about our plan to acquire Black Diamond.
Many of Advent’s very first clients were (like many of you) advisory firms looking to grow their businesses by harnessing the power of technology. Most of those firms are still our clients today and I’m proud that Advent has played a role in their success.
The market has changed and grown dramatically in recent years, and with it, your technology needs. Over the past few years, Advent has invested significantly in innovating for alternative managers and asset managers, but we realized we needed to do more to support advisory firms. This acquisition represents our opportunity to accelerate our ability to help advisors be great with an innovative, purpose-built platform.
Personally, I have greatly enjoyed getting to know the team at Black Diamond. From my first conversation with Reed and his team, it’s been clear that our core beliefs are remarkably similar and our values are completely aligned about what we believe is possible for this market.
Reed and his management team will be in charge of Advent’s advisory strategy, and Black Diamond will become an independent business group within the Company led by Reed. From product development to client service to sales, the team you know will be the team that continues to develop and innovate on the Black Diamond platform. As part of the Advent family, Black Diamond will have access to additional expertise, technology and the resources to accelerate their growth and innovation.
Advent is passionate about making our clients successful, and we share that passion with Black Diamond. Together, I believe Advent and Black Diamond can be an even better, faster, and stronger partner for you.
Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns – we welcome your feedback; in fact, we’ve set up a blog at http://blogs.advent.com/executive-view and we invite you to join the conversation, or you can email me directly at [email protected]. In the meantime, thank you for the opportunity to work together.
Stephanie DiMarco
CEO and Founder
 
Palantir Wrote:
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> I’m trying out the M* Office software, really
> looks very good for the research/PM part, don’t
> know about accounting yet.
About to finish our two week eval period. Its impressive. Some fairly advanced reporting capabilities. Very expensive though.
 
we have M* office (just use it for research though) and its only ~$4,000 (have a discount through custodian).
We looked at the price difference for all of principia vs. office and decided for the little bit extra, office was the way to go.
The outsourced reconcilation might be expensive?
 
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