Pathway: Private Wealth

Balance-sheet services: lending (mortgages, Lombard/securities-based loans), deposits, and treasury/credit facilities alongside discretionary or advisory portfolio management. Access to the bank's credit and product shelf is its key differentiator.

Wirehouses/brokerages employ advisers under a large firm brand with proprietary products, broad platforms and historically transaction-based pay; independent RIAs are typically smaller, owner-operated firms that charge advisory fees, use third-party custodians, and are held out as fiduciaries with fewer product-sales conflicts.

An SFO serves one wealthy family exclusively, giving full control, privacy and customization but at high fixed cost (usually justified only at very large wealth). An MFO serves several families, sharing infrastructure and specialists to lower per-family cost at the expense of some customization and control.

Its costs (staff, systems, compliance, specialists) are largely fixed; spread over a small asset base they become a very high percentage of assets. Only at large scale does the cost ratio fall to a level comparable with outsourced alternatives.

A digital platform that uses questionnaires and algorithms to build and rebalance (often ETF-based) portfolios at low cost with little or no human contact. It mainly targets mass-affluent and younger, cost-sensitive investors with simpler needs.

A hybrid model combines digital portfolio construction and onboarding with access to human advisers for planning, complex questions and behavioral coaching, at a fee between robo and full-service. A pure robo has minimal or no human interaction.