Bloomberg’s quiet wealth management operation

John Carney of CNBC.com writes about BloombergBlack, the quiet wealth management operation controlled by Bloomberg LP, and what it might mean for the company’s financial data and news operation.

Carney writes, “That first bullet point seems almost like an attempt to salve any future wounds Bloomberg’s wealth management business might inflict on the customers of the terminal business. Look! We’re not telling customers to leave you for us! This isn’t competition! We’re complementary to you!

“But is that realistic? At $100 a month, BloombergBlack is priced pretty steeply. Even the affluent customers Bloomberg is targeting may balk at the idea of paying fees to more than one wealth manager.

“What BloombergBlack has going for it — other than the well-known brand — is a huge information infrastructure already in place. Customers will presumably have access to lots of information that is otherwise difficult to uncover. Investors who believe that more information will make them better investors will find this enticing.

“This is never going to be a source of revenue on the scale of the terminals. Online wealth management is a pretty low-margin business. But since Bloomberg already has so much of the underlying data infrastructure in place, it makes sense to find new ways to generate revenue from that infrastructure.

“As long as it doesn’t tick off the folks paying for the terminals too much.”

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.