TD bulks up 401(k) services for advisers

TD Ameritrade Institutional has rolled out an expanded set of services to help its financial advisers offer unbundled retirement plan solutions.

One new service is access to a list of 12 third-party record keepers that advisers can use in setting up a retirement plan.

“We interface with about 100 [record keepers] around the country, but that doesn’t narrow it down enough for many advisers,” said Skip Schweiss, president of TD Ameritrade Trust Co.

The dozen firms chosen do a “significant amount of business with us, have good, tight operational interfaces and have some geographical dispersion,” he said. The record keepers didn’t pay to be included, Mr. Schweiss said.

A number of pending regulatory changes increasing fee transparency in the retirement plan marketplace will give unbundled providers an advantage, he said.

With unbundled plan providers, “all the fees are out there for everyone to see,” Mr. Schweiss said. “And if someone falls down on the job, you can change providers without greatly disrupting [the plan].”

Another enhancement lets TD Ameritrade advisers handle plan participants’ self-directed-brokerage accounts through the firm’s adviser trading platform, Veo.

Advisers can trade, re-balance, deduct management fees and download self-directed-account data into their portfolio management and accounting systems.

E-mail Dan Jamieson at djamieson@investmentnews .com.