Dan Jowett
CEO, Openmarkets Group (OMG)
Dan has 25 years’ experience across stockbroking, wealth management, funds management and investment banking. Prior to OMG, Dan spent a decade at Shaw and Partners as COO and CFO, after providing financial assurance and advisory services at PwC and KPMG. Dan is responsible for the overall group strategy, P&L and revenue growth.
Insights from Dan
Dan joined OMG at the start of 2022, and has shaped the company into the more focused and agile company that it is today.
The move from Shaw and Partners
Moving from my role of COO at Shaw and Partners has been a very interesting and fantastic change for me. There are many structural changes in our industry which attracted me to OMG. Themes such as the intergenerational transfer of wealth and the increasing demand for end-to-end technology across wealth are both trends that OMG is extremely well-positioned to continue to capitalise on. OMG has become the destination of choice for many of the new fintech platforms over the last few years, demonstrating our success in these areas.
Volatility and derivatives
Since the GFC, derivatives markets have been marked by extended periods of low volatility, punctuated by spikes. Investors tended to congregate around short volatility strategies to enhance stand-still returns while maintaining core portfolio holdings. The new cycle is likely to favour long volatility strategies to lever or even replace some holdings. This will inherently limit downside risk and enhance upside performance.
Appropriate risk assessment and planned use of derivative strategies can help with portfolio returns for certain clients (which was the thinking behind Openmarkets Risk Manager, an incredible tool we've developed for managing risk in the derivatives space). Advice and education remain important for more complex strategies.
Crypto still bubbling away
There is no doubt many of us think differently today on this topic than a year or two ago! The emergence of futures contracts on crypto, as well as crypto ETFs overseas and in Australia have seen greater interest from international and domestic large wealth management firms as well as retail investors. We received several enquiries on crypto as a product and it’s something we have been looking at for a while. The crypto area to watch will be regulation of the sector.
How we serve our clients
Like all of us who work in this fantastic industry, OMG is privileged that clients have trusted us with their wealth. For me personally, I enjoy leading OMG and helping to provide important infrastructure, technology and services at a competitive price point that helps enable our clients to build their wealth. Let’s go!