Morningstar Enhances Website

Morningstar’s free website provides financial advisers with practice management information, investment trends and industry insight.

In addition to the new Alternatives tab, the site now contains Morningstar market tools and an expanded video library featuring interviews with top portfolio managers and newsmakers, analysts, and some of the leading voices in the advisory community. It also includes access to research reports on funds, stocks, ETFs, closed-end funds and alternatives.

The site has three main content tabs: Alternatives, Practice Management, and Research & Insights.  

•  Alternatives, the site’s newest tab, provides detailed educational information and analysis of alternative investments, in vehicles such as hedge funds, ETFs, mutual funds and separate accounts; weekly articles discussing the latest on alternative investment topics and trends; access to Morningstar’s comprehensive quarterly Alternative Investments Observer newsletter; video interviews with alternative investment managers; downloadable handbooks explaining different alternative strategies; and a Solution Center featuring videos and slides designed to help advisers educate their clients about alternative investments.

•  Practice Management, which was recently expanded, includes adviser profiles, fiduciary topics, technology news and reviews, and best practices for building an advisory business.

•  Research & Insights features in-depth interviews with leading portfolio managers, research on college savings plans, screening tips for the best stocks and funds for a client portfolio, sector spotlights, and commentary from Don Phillips, Morningstar’s president of fund research.

"We want to create a destination site where financial advisers can find timely information to improve their practices, as well as help investors who depend on their guidance," said Chris Boruff, president of Morningstar's software division.

The enhanced site features additional components for social interactivity, a discussion feature allowing adviser dialogue and debate on articles and industry issues, a webinar audio archive, and links to Morningstar's adviser services, publications and software platforms—Morningstar Advisor Workstation, Morningstar Office and Morningstar Principia.

RAMP, a web-content optimization company based in Woburn, Massachusetts, worked with Morningstar to develop the new user interface and menu navigation, adding faster search and browsing capabilities, and integrating an iPad-enabled video player with a searchable transcript feature.