Moneyfarm, the digital wealth manager, has today launched a partnership with Allianz Global Investors which will provide access to an active wealth management solution at institutional cost to UK employees of Allianz companies. This follows Allianz’s strategic investment in Moneyfarm, which was announced in September 2016.

In an industry and European first, the two organisations have developed a new active wealth management solution called Moneyfarm powered by Allianz Global Investors. The product, which was built in just three months, will combine Moneyfarm’s digital customer experience and investor profiling with Allianz Global Investors’ unparalleled expertise in active investment management. Moneyfarm will also manage all operations, and the partnership acts a proof point of the flexibility of the Moneyfarm platform.

Portfolios will be made up of Allianz Global Investors and PIMCO funds, and will be accessible to UK Allianz employees at a price usually only available to large institutional investors.

The on-boarding process utilises Moneyfarm’s existing consumer service; on sign-up customers are asked a series of questions and aligned to one of six investor profiles. Allianz employees will then be offered affordable, and appropriate advice, combined with strong risk management tailored to an investor profile.

The investment management process is outsourced to Allianz Global Investors who define a strategic asset allocation based on risk levels that Moneyfarm creates; all investment management decisions are approved by the Moneyfarm Investment Committee.

The launch of Moneyfarm powered by Allianz Global Investors launched internally earlier this month. Whilst it is still early days, the response from Allianz employees in the UK has been positive. This is the first time UK employees from across the Allianz family have had access to a wealth management solution in this way.

Moneyfarm’s main website will continue to offer portfolios to the public built of exchange traded funds, whilst this new product will only be available to Allianz employees. Whilst the active versus passive management debate rages on in the industry, Moneyfarm believes that both active and passive instruments can work well together as part of an investment strategy, provided the cost, and product quality enables strong real performance for the end investor.

Paolo Galvani, Chairman and co-founder of Moneyfarm, comments: “This partnership is a natural extension of our existing product and demonstrates its flexibility. Enabling Allianz employees in the UK to invest with active funds through a digital interface is the next step for Moneyfarm in terms of delivering our model and solution across the full investment lifecycle.”

Galvani continues: “Combining user friendly technology, with human interaction and human investment management is a great progression of our hybrid model. One of the key reasons we wanted to work with Allianz was their hunger to explore the digital wealth management space, and this partnership is an exciting taste of things to come.”

“The launch of this programme in the UK is an exciting first step in our partnership with Moneyfarm, giving our UK-based colleagues access to professional investment management via a fully digital platform using actively managed Allianz Global Investors funds” says Tobias C. Pross, Head of EMEA at Allianz Global Investors.

Pross continues: “Moneyfarm has been an excellent partner in building an employee offering for us, their timely delivery has enabled us to launch this to our employees during ISA season. This gives a strong impression in terms of reconciling automated advice and active management. For us, this serves as a pilot to dive deeper into our hybrid model of advisory.”