Fintech

Fidelity adds trading to WealthCentral Mobile

Advisers can conduct transactions over iPhones and Android smart phones

Financial advisers on the WealthCentral platform can now add trading to the list of things they can do from their iPhones and later model Android smart phones.
Fidelity Institutional Wealth Services has added trading features to both the iPhone version of WealthCentral Mobile, rolled out in February and a version for the Android operating system, rolled out a month later.
Edward O’Brien, senior vice president and head of technology with Fidelity IWS, told Investment News that trading represented the next logical progression in the feature set to be added to WealthCentral Mobile and had been heavily requested by advisers.
“Whether an adviser is on vacation and places a trade through the mobile version or is in the office accessing WealthCentral from his or her desktop, it is a very consistent experience for them,” he said.
When asked how many advisers were now using the WealthCentral Mobile application, Mitch Rodriguez, vice president of technology product management with Fidelity IWS, responded that there are 2,000, mostly using the iPhone version. But he added that Android’s share is growing swiftly.
Asked about the speed of trade processing Mr. Rodriguez was quick to respond: “Mobile trades are not routed through any other system,” he said.”These really just represent different access points to the WealthCentral platform.”
Advisory firms can also control the provisioning of these features to their advisers at the user level, granting trading capabilities only to those advisers who are entitled to them.
The Fidelity adviser custody unit has also introduced a second level of authentication for the trading features through use of a token. This feature is offered through a partnership between IWS and a third-party security provider.
Both versions of the mobile application remain a free download for advisers with WealthCentral login credentials.
Those already using one of the mobile versions will be notified of downloadable update to get the new trading functions.
Advisers still on the legacy Advisor Channel platform, however, will have to wait until they have been migrated to WealthCentral before they can get the mobile applications.
A version of the mobile platform for the iPad remains in development.