Zagari stressed how key quick access to those resources is for an advisor like him. If he can sit his clients down with a chief market strategist to discuss market trends, or he can get them in touch with an estate or tax planning expert rapidly, he has an advantage. As the industry continues to emphasize these additional and ancillary services, Zagari argues that he wants to work with a firm that can offer those services in a timely and capable manner. He says that he sees in Wellington-Altus a robust enough investment to deliver what he and his clients need.
Wellington-Altus is not the only firm making these investments, though. Plenty of firms will extoll their new strategists, their advanced planning tools, and their technology investments. What also differentiated Wellington-Altus in Zagari’s mind was their openness to strong opinions.
Zagari is an advisor with strong views. A passionate advocate for bitcoin in client portfolios, he’s made a name for himself as a Canadian expert on blockchain and bitcoin investing. He is not afraid to share his opinions, and he wants a firm that can share theirs right back to him. Zagari thrives with some degree of intellectual clash and debate, challenging his own ideas and other ideas to refine and improve them.
In his interactions with the portfolio management team, Zagari has heard them frequently ask ‘what do you mean by that?’ when he offers a viewpoint. They want to interrogate his assumptions and see if he knows what he’s talking about. At the same time, he says he’s found a team that listens and can take his knowledge onboard, even leveraging him as a resource.
While he has been having these portfolio management conversations and challenging his ideas, Zagari has also had to deal with the minutiae and paperwork of a practice transition. He says, however, that the process has been easier than he expected. With a dedicated team of four his new firm has moved over 80 per cent of his practice within six weeks. It’s been a lot of work — extending into evenings and weekends — but Zagari has seen meaningful progress in a relatively short period of time.
