WisdomTree, Inc. (NYSE:WT) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

You’ve seen it in Merrill and some of the things that I pointed out, how we’ve seen a doubling in assets and advisors in the last year. They were one of the first on the models of the big platform players. So we’ve got that kind of momentum building with our other platform partners. Then on the RIAs and IBDs, there you do have more of an operational component where we want to help those advisors who don’t have the same resource that the buyers have, the big platforms. We help them build their models, implement their models, trade their models and that’s really the replication of the wirehouse easy button. The other thing I’d add is that I guess, if you think about it, every sale is a model sale. If in the old days when we were just going, before we had a models effort, you were still trying to win a position in an existing advisor or home office model.

Now what we get to go out and do is provide a model solution, which when we have a win there, it’s a multi ticker win. It’s a very long-term and sticky win. But that’s sort of a second type of model win is the third-party model platforms. Then the third is that working with advisors to customize their models for them and solve operational or workflow issues. But the other thing that you’ve heard in one of the answers from, or, and actually in Jona’s remarks is through WisdomTree Prime. That’s another model opportunity and soon we’ll be launching those effectively WisdomTree Siegel funds, that is really a models like experience. So it’s another model opportunity for us. So hopefully, I answered your question, but a ton of opportunity there and a ton of momentum.

Adam Beatty: That’s great. Thank you. You mentioned Jeremy. I don’t know if Jeremy wants to weigh in.

Jonathan Steinberg: Jeremy, do you?

Jarrett Lilien: I think we are certainly doing a lot with Professor Siegel. As you heard about, the Merril models have we are we’re working on that, the Morgan Stanley models. We have that those come in Prime. He has been a leading figure for us on this idea of interest rates, when I talked about the senior economist upgrading outlook for rates. He has been a big proponent of where things are going. So, all those things are mutually beneficial and driving this diversified close set.

Adam Beatty: Excellent. That’s great detail, exactly what I was looking. For every sale as a model sale, I love it. All for me today, thanks a lot.

Operator: [Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from Mike Brown with KBW. Please state your question.

Mike Brown: Great. Thank you for taking my questions. I guess just starting with the USFR product, it is clearly been a major success here. But it is, I guess, levered to rising rates. I suppose it is hard to say, but how much of the assets do you think are more tactical in nature that could be a risk when the Fed starts to cut versus how much might just be more of a cash allocation that could be stickier? And maybe just a quick follow on. How much of the flows, just maybe a percentage have come from the models and therefore could probably be more sticky? Thank you.

Jonathan Steinberg: Jeremy, you want to start and then maybe, Jared?

Jeremy Schwartz: Well, I think I gave this view that, we think rates, the long-term rates, I alluded that we think rates could stay higher for longer. You would have thought, if rates could be really painful, you would have seen more of a slowdown even this year. And so, we think sort of the longer-term settling of rates is that, they may not fall back to that zero rate environment that you had, that even sort of the 10 year, maybe it settles at 3% over the longer run versus where it got down to sub 1% on the 10 year. So, we don’t think these rates are going back down quickly anytime soon. There is definitely a group who uses it for this cash management. We talked about Prime as one of the nice features of how do we take it to the next level with adding spending features on top of these things.