Company Profile

OUR HISTORY AND FUTURE

Since its inception in 2002, eBIS has dedicated itself to financial services and the challenges facing this industry.  Originally dedicated to serving institutional clients, we have delivered numerous solutions to help our clients implement risk-appropriate investment portfolios, understand their businesses better, execute a strategic vision, meet regulatory requirements, and improve internal processes (see our success stories).  Leveraging our knowledge capital in both finance and solution delivery, we build bridges between the two, using questions to generate ideas, and our best practice toolkit to deliver them as solutions.

We created our professional services firm out of two drivers: independent thought and innovation. In our experience, these two factors contribute overwhelmingly to the success of any initiative. Institutions, be they banks, asset managers, regulatory agencies or retirement plan providers, often find success using products or methods in which they’ve developed a competency. Then things change. New opportunities arise. New requirements are mandated. It’s those firms that are agile enough to adapt that thrive, using independent thought and innovative ideas as the catalyst.

On each engagement, we commit to the innovation that drove our creation.  The ability to generate new ideas and the dedication to realize them as solutions: this mantra guides us.  We approach every challenge with the objective of thinking in new ways, questioning conventional wisdom until we’ve exhausted all options and arrived at the best one.  We are financial modelers and financial architects with a passion for solving problems and a commitment to the satisfaction of our clients.

In 2012, we extended our institutional solution offerings to include retirement plan fiduciary services, creating a symbiosis between our portfolio risk management and professional consulting offerings and the growth of defined contribution retirement plans.  Most institutions want to offer a retirement plan for their employees, but don’t want the fiduciary responsibility or administrative overhead.  Therein lies our core strenghts: investment risk management married with program management and regulatory adherence to deliver a quality employee benefit.  Further, retirement readiness stands as one of America’s foremost social problems, with Social Security inadequate to maintain one’s living standard and the corporate safety net, through defined benefit pension plans, all but vanished.  As a firm, we want to not just do well, but do good.  Applying our aptitude and energy to a problem like retirement readiness helps us address the latter.  We want our retirement plan solution to serve one end: help more Americans retire with dignity.

In 2013, we expanded our business to retail clients, offering direct investment management and financial planning services as a fee-only Registered Investment Adviser (RIA), bound by the fiduciary standard. Given more than a decade of violently turbulent financial markets and our institutional experience in analyzing and modeling all forms of financial risk, this expansion seemed a natural next step for our firm.  Moreover, we think retail investment advice is in need of significant reform, having evolved from commission-driven stock picking a la The Wolf of Wall Street during the last century, to this century seeing the fee-only independent adviser model dominate, grounded in market efficiency while managing costs and taxes.  However, the advice industry has not yet focused on risk management as the primary driver of investor success.  We believe our future course as a RIA will allow us to help shape needed reform and deliver risk-sensitive investment solutions tailored to current financial markets, paired with comprehensive financial planning.  With interest rates well below historical norms, equity markets controlled by central banks and retirement savings rates woefully low, now is the time for a new direction: a focus on risk.

The financial services industry continues to evolve. With new entrants in financial technology introducing investment products never seen before, increased sophistication in portfolio modeling, and a dynamic regulatory landscape being shaped by the aftermath of the global credit crisis, innovative financial solutions are needed now more than ever. eBIS is here to help.

OUR NICHE

RETAIL

Our corporate metaphor is the span of a bridge, addressing a gap we’ve observed in the retail investment advisory space. Traditional investment advisers generally fall into two camps: 1) those pitching investment performance or 2) those selling market efficiency married to tax management and low costs. Then markets blow up (reference: tech bubble, credit crisis), evidence that performance chasing exacerbates losses and market participants, at certain cyclical points, can exhibit decidely irrational behavior. In short, neither of the two camps got it right. Investors have learned the hard way that risk can take many forms, rears its head frequently, and should be at the forefront of any investment strategy. Today’s investment environment demands risk management. What investment model builds a bridge between the key investment variables in modern economies: the latest in financial innovation, available asset classes, and risk quantification? eBIS delivers this risk model and resulting investment strategy, a key bridge to deliver you from a financial plan to a realized financial goal.

INSTITUTIONAL

For large institutions, strategy consultancies and packaged product providers sell transformative ideas: a turnkey 401(k) product from an insurance company, a credit risk solution from a software vendor. Then, implementation partners promise to make the vision a reality with a services business unit. What connects these two, and just as importantly, acts as a check and balance against both? Further, what firm can deliver a custom solution when the packaged product proves too rigid? eBIS is this company, bridging strategic ideas and realized solutions by offering independent views that add business value. Whether you need better cohesion between the latest academic research and bundled solution offerings, an independent view on a tactical initiative, or something in between: our role as bridge builders is important, one every initiative should embrace.

We are a privately held professional services firm, focused on financial services.  eBIS lies in the niche of small, industry-specific firms comprised of expert professionals who provide independent thought and depth of industry knowledge.  We believe the presence of deeply qualified, independent thinkers is vital to your success, and often difficult to find through traditional service partnerships.

Our clients agree: the eBIS client list spans a range, from top ten international and U.S. financial institutions in commercial and retail banking, investment banking and asset management to medium-sized businesses sponsoring a retirement plan to individuals in need of investment management and retirement planning.

How can we help you?  Contact us if you need a reliable bridge to get from strategic ideas to realized solutions, while managing risk and maximizing return on investment.