Vestmark, T. Rowe Price team up for new RIA-focused model portfolios

Vestmark and T. Rowe Price are teaming up on a new model portfolio offering aimed at RIAs looking to scale personalization and tax management for clients without building everything in-house.

The firms have launched Custom Premier, a jointly developed portfolio solution that lets advisors tailor ETF and mutual fund models to client preferences, risk profiles, and tax situations, while relying on T. Rowe Price for portfolio design and Vestmark for implementation and ongoing tax management. RIAs can access the custom models on the Vestmark platform with no platform fee, according to the announcement.

Custom Premier is pitched as a way for advisors to move beyond off-the-shelf models but still keep workflows efficient. The offering combines T. Rowe Price’s model portfolio research, construction, and capital markets views with Vestmark’s tax-aware trading and rebalancing engine. The aim is to help advisors align portfolios more closely with client goals, manage tax exposure across accounts and households, and execute changes consistently at scale.

Rob Battista, executive vice president of advisory solutions at Vestmark, said the collaboration is intended to give RIAs more tools to fine-tune portfolios while keeping taxes in view. He said in the statement that Custom Premier “leverages the best of both firms, T. Rowe Price’s deep investment expertise and Vestmark’s scalable tax optimization.”

The firms are positioning the launch as a response to increased demand from RIAs for customizable model portfolios that still come with institutional-level oversight and risk management. 

“RIAs today need personalized portfolio solutions that go beyond one-size-fits-all models,” said Josh Horesh, head of US model portfolio distribution at T. Rowe Price. He said the collaboration is meant to blend structure and flexibility so that advisors can adapt portfolios while staying within a defined framework.

The Custom Premier offering joins an already-thriving landscape of model portfolios in the US, with custom model assets amounting to $184 billion as of March last year, according to data from Morningstar. 

"Model portfolios have really become a staple for financial advisors, but there’s no one‑size‑fits‑all portfolio," Stephen Margaria, an analyst on Morningstar's multi-asset and alternative strategies research team, told InvestmentNews. "Every client is different, so there’s been increasing demand from advisors for more tailored portfolios for their clients."

Morningstar's most recent Model Portfolio Landscape report counted just north of a bilion dollars of assets within T. Rowe Price's custom models business, putting them in the top 10 within the research giant's mapping of the custom model space.

Aside from Vestmark and T. Rowe Price, Margaria points to other asset managers and platforms announcing synergistic tie-ups around model portfolios. Last June, Envestnet unveiled a lineup of model portfolios in partnership with multiple asset managers, including heavy hitters like Fidelity, BlackRock, State Street, and Franklin Templeton.

"These partnerships make sense for asset managers: the asset managers bring their asset‑management expertise, while the technology platforms like Vestmark bring technology capabilities for portfolio management and tax management," Margaria said. "Advisors are increasingly looking for more 'all‑in‑one' partners – taking the relationship a step further than just using [one provider's] funds, and partnering on custom solutions as well."

From his standpoint, the new Custom Premier offering from T. Rowe Price and Vestmark hits on the key features advisors have come to expect from custom model portfolios. Beyond that, he sees asset managers developing solutions that allow for fund or vehicle substitutions, additional asset classes not offered in off-the-shelf models, and the ability to adjust the number of funds that can be included in a portfolio.

"It’s getting more competitive as more asset managers jump in and recognize there’s an opportunity," Margaria said. "We’re going to continue to see capabilities evolve – not just on the asset‑management side, but also on the technology‑platform side."