Financial Advisor-Focused WealthTech Takes Center Stage Once More

Derek Bruton has held leadership roles across major custodial firms and independent broker-dealers, including Charles Schwab, TD Ameritrade and LPL Financial, but he didn't start out in wealth management. The Stanford graduate from the class of 1989 played professional basketball in Japan his first few years after school, after playing on his college basketball team for four years on an athletic scholarship. "I recall two things about my first game, in Hokkaido, which is the northern-most Japanese island" he said. "The gym was ice cold, and when I was warming up there was steam coming off of everyone's body." Bruton, who now serves as CEO of Kingswood US, a hybrid RIA and broker-dealer with over $2.1 billion in assets, sees parallels between his basketball stint in a foreign country learning the ropes in real time on how to best integrate with his teammates and the complexities of aligning the right wealthtech for financial advisors.