RIA Edge Day 2Tuesday, 20 October 2026 - PT (Pacific Time, GMT-08:00)

Every client interaction contains signals about changing needs, untapped assets and emerging planning opportunities, but most firms struggle to capture and act on them. This panel will explore how RIAs can use AI to connect conversations, client behavior and firmwide data, helping advisors identify opportunities sooner, personalize outreach and turn everyday interactions into meaningful growth.

Location: Monarch Ballroom

MCP. AI agents. Everyone's throwing around the jargon. Almost nobody explains it in a way an advisor can actually use.

Matt Halloran is a panel with three companies building the plumbing behind AI in wealth management: Zocks (Dan Neidermire), Conquest (Tom Burmeister), and Flyer Financial Technologies (Scott Scherr). Session: "Be Curious, Not Judgmental About MCP and AI," RIA Edge Orange County.

No slides. No sales pitch. Just a real conversation about what's actually changing, why your hesitation about AI is normal (we heard the same thing about robo-advisors), and what to fix first before your competitors do.

40 minutes, plain language, no jargon left unexplained. Stick around after and we'll keep answering questions.

Location: Monarch Ballroom

Peer-reviewed research on trust delivers some surprising insights for wealth firms: People trust someone who seems to care about them more than someone who seems skilled. A promise with no track record earns less trust than no promise at all. And a personal text builds more trust than a video call.

Grad Conn, CMO of Humanity Labs, reduces the research to one equation with two parts. Clients trust the people who know them. And they trust a firm whose work is always correct and on time. But firms grow by hiring, and every hour spent getting the work right is an hour not spent with a client. That is the headcount ceiling.

Grad offers a solution: Hand the reviews, paperwork, and follow-through to an AI Workforce. The work gets done in full, and advisors get their time back for building relationships.

Location: Monarch Ballroom

Location: Monarch Ballroom

Location: Monarch Ballroom

Roundtable discussions offer a unique forum for engaging conversations and collaborative problem-solving in small groups of your peers. Each roundtable discussion will be carefully curated to address a specific topic or challenge, ensuring that you can choose sessions aligned with your interests and professional goals.

Sell Now or Later?: What Makes Sense in a Red Hot Merger Market

Is it better to sell now or continue invest in growth, putting off liquidity for a later date? With coverage of the RIA M&A market vacillating between discussions of the "highest multiples on record" and "valuations are at risk" we'll take a direct approach to what is actually happening and the signs that could indicate if a changing (M&A) market could be on the horizon.

Facilitator: Rob Madore, Director, Marsh Berry

One Standard of Care: MNW Clients, UHNW Service

What would a firm look like if it served Median Net Worth (MNW) clients as fiercely as Ultra High Net Worth (UHNW) clients? A candid discussion on the economics and service model, from a founder currently working on the answer.

Facilitator: Jeff Richardson, Founder, CIO, Trovera Capital Management, LLC

Scaling Without Losing What Made You Successful

How do you grow your firm without losing the personal touch and values that attracted clients in the first place? Connect with fellow advisors navigating the delicate balance between expansion and maintaining what makes your practice exceptional.

Facilitator: Rob Sandrew, Head of Mariner Independent, Mariner

When Every RIA Uses AI for Marketing, What’s Your Edge?

Sounding like everyone else, faster, isn’t going to cut it when Schwab is spending $420M on advertising. Join Will Steiner for a conversation about combining human creativity and AI to give prospects a reason to choose your firm—we’ll discuss what to automate, where agents fit in, what needs a human, and what to do next.

Facilitator: Will Steiner, Founder, Silvy

Why domain-specialized language models (DSLMs) will be the future of Wealth Management

Explore why DSLMs could outperform general-purpose AI in wealth management and how firms can leverage them for smarter decisions and competitive advantage.

Facilitator: Af Malhotra, Founder & CEO, ReN

Facts and fictions about RIA M&A – Debunking myths and setting the record straight

Facilitator: Dan Newhall, Executive Vice President, Retirement & Wealth, Alliant

Location: Monarch Terrace

Location: Monarch Ballroom

As RIA firms grow, client experience is often the first casualty, and the hardest to rebuild. Firms aspire to offer differentiated, high-touch service but lack the architecture to sustain it across multiple offices and dispersed teams. This session draws on the model Savant Wealth Management has built as one of the fastest-growing RIAs in the country. Rob Morrison, who built a 1,000-family practice before becoming Savant's Chief Experience Officer, has not only lived the Savant model, he helped build it. He will explore Savant’s “Mayo Clinic” integrated specialist model that replaces the solo generalist with a deep bench of niche strategists (CPAs, attorneys, etc.), and how values-based goal setting builds loyalty beyond portfolio performance. The session also examines how AI expands advisor capacity for proactive, personalized service without sacrificing the human connection that drives retention. Attendees leave with practical frameworks and a sharper sense of where the client experience bar is heading.

Location: Monarch Ballroom