Our Advantage

Experience

The depth and breadth of our entire team distinguishes us from most of our peers. Our investment management team members average 25 years of experience and collectively have over 275 years of experience across a wide array of investment asset classes, styles, and situations. Our operations team members likewise possess decades of experience in dealing with a broad range of service providers and the myriad of issues that arise on a daily basis. We are confident that the vast experience of our entire team working together is well suited to address your needs.

Total Firm Approach

At Azimuth you are a client of the firm, not some group or team within an organization. We function as a collective unit and regularly discuss client situations across our entire team. This fosters a more collaborative culture and better leverages our experience, benefiting our clients and the firm. Clients will engage with multiple members of the Azimuth team depending upon your specific investment management and service needs. We reinforce this approach with a compensation structure that emphasizes the success of our entire firm.

Client-Focused Service Standard

We know managing money is not our only obligation. Our standard of service is not based on what our competitors provide, but rather how we would want to be treated as a client. We also understand the level of service that our clients expect in other facets of their life and set our client service standards accordingly. Managing your wealth requires an intimate knowledge of your circumstances, a commitment to having the appropriate resources, a sense of urgency in our actions, and firmwide focus on your needs.

In-House Investment Management

Based on our experience we believe it’s important to directly manage the investment process for the client, not outsource to third-party firms. This enables a more direct connection between client goals and investment decision making. Avoiding third-party managers also eliminates a layer of fees assessed to clients and enhances accountability of the management of your assets. The following are key elements of our in-house investment management process:

Portfolios Built with Individual Securities — From a transparency, diversification, performance, risk management, and tax perspective we believe in most client situations that building portfolios of individual securities is superior to employing funds, ETFs, or other pooled investment products. We customize the allocation between our various strategies based on the client’s situation.

Long-Term Focus — Wealth isn’t created overnight, and the continued growth of such wealth should be accomplished through a long-term perspective. The longer-term market results can be both very compelling and quite reliable, as opposed to a shorter-term market mindset. Clients’ financial goals typically span generations and we believe the approach to managing your assets should have a similar time horizon. Thus, we work with you to develop a diversified investment portfolio that aligns with your long-term objectives and risk tolerance.

Quality Orientation — Our extensive investment experience has resulted in a preference to emphasize “Quality” in selecting securities within our investment process. We prioritize companies or securities with characteristics such as strong balance sheets and favorable earnings growth outlooks through our rigorous investment management process. By focusing on quality, our investment strategies aim to deliver favorable long-term performance and a smoother (less volatile) ride for clients, allowing for a longer-term focus.

Third-Party Research — There is no shortage of varying opinions in the investment business. Rather than be captive to a single source of data and research, we developed a proprietary approach to synthesizing a variety of data points and views into our investment management process. We feel that different perspectives are of great value. Thus, we access numerous third-party macroeconomic and individual security research firms to evaluate market conditions or a security from different vantage points. This approach supports our objective of providing superior results.

Broad Planning Capabilities — We are well versed in individual financial planning, estate and trust structures, tax management, as well as strategic planning for a variety of entities. Our collective experience also involves serving in a number of different roles from investment manager, board member or trustee, or outside advisor. To meet your specific planning needs, we draw upon our involvement in a wide range of financial situations.

Growing Wealth Through Generations — Investment management across multiple generations can be quite complex. Our team has the experience, knowledge, and capabilities to help address the intricacies of managing trusts, estates, and assets to meet the unique needs of each generation. As importantly, we embrace collaborating with your other professionals to seek the optimal solution for your family.

Tax Management — Each client’s tax situation can be unique and can also change over time. Our in-house investment management using individual securities provides vital precision to manage each client’s unique tax circumstances, as opposed to a standardized program. Such precision is important when undertaking tax loss harvesting, determining the timing of selling or gifting individual securities, and selecting the appropriate type of fixed income security to employ in a client portfolio. These are not decisions we outsource to an investment manager handling assets the same way for thousands of other investors — they are tax-efficient solutions customized to your current situation.

The safety and security of your assets is critically important. The typical industry model consolidates the custody of assets, execution of security transactions, account reconciliation, and investment decision-making with a single provider – a closed loop. We believe our approach to investment management enhances safety and security and provides other benefits to clients through the following checks and balances:

Independent Third-Party Custodians — Your assets managed by Azimuth are held in a separate account at an independent third-party custodian, providing an additional degree of security. Therefore, client assets are generally not pooled with those of others into a fund or other structure. You authorize us to manage the assets within your individual account through the buying and selling of securities. However, only you can authorize the movement of cash or securities completely out of your account. Another important safeguard is that you receive account statements showing holdings and activity delivered directly by the third-party custodian. These statements are separate from the reports you receive from us.

Open Architecture — Securities transactions for client accounts are executed with a variety of select brokers, including third-party brokers. This “shopping around” with a select group of brokers is undertaken with the objective to obtain desirable liquidity, better execution pricing, and greater information to achieve more favorable results for our clients.

True Account Reconciliation — We maintain our own internal portfolio management and accounting systems, which we also use to deliver reports separate from those provided by the custodian for review and comparison. In addition, we perform a daily reconciliation between our system and your custodian’s system to ensure that account holdings, values, and activity are accurately recorded. Any discrepancies can then be promptly identified and resolved by our operations team. These systems and associated processes require more resources and effort — but deliver an important check and balance of more reliable information that we believe is well worth the ongoing investment we make for you.