PLSA Investor Conference 2019: Key themes

Last week the AMX team and I were at the PLSA Investor Conference in Edinburgh. It was great to be there amongst our peers and attend the sessions. With over 1,000 attendees this was truly a forum where all parts of the industry came together to discuss our shared future.

Throughout the conference I had many fascinating conversations. These were my key takeaways:

• Our industry needs to build trust with end investors – a recent survey by the PLSA found that only a third of non-retired people with a pension trust the financial services industry. I believe a crucial ingredient to building trust with end investors is updating the underlying structure of our industry - how we do business. Technology has the potential to make everything more transparent and efficient for trustees, managers and end investors.
• “It’s the way the industry is going” – this was a comment we heard frequently from delegates when discussing our institutional investment platform. There now seems to be a broad acknowledgement within the industry of the benefits that a centralised platform can offer.
• The ESG debate is heating up – ESG considerations, including climate change, are increasingly being included in portfolios across both active and passive investments. The challenge for the industry is not only how ESG factors are integrated into portfolios but also how this information is made transparent to investors.  
• “What gets measured can be managed” – the PLSA’s Cost Transparency Initiative is making great strides to improve cost awareness amongst trustees and asset owners. Better understanding the costs involved in the process of investing, and ensuring end users are getting value for money, is a topic close to our hearts at AMX.
• Advances in technology bring opportunities – but the speed of change is accelerating. In the session ‘Sleepless in CIO-Land’ we heard about Japanese hotels where bellboys and receptionists have already been replaced by robots. We need to educate people for the new digital age and ensure that we’re on the right side of the wave of change.

Thanks to PLSA for organising such a brilliant event and to everyone who came to see us at the AMX stand. You all made our event and we hope to keep those conversations going over the coming months.