Online broker TD Ameritrade is rolling out a soft launch of a mobile application for long-term investors with managed accounts named TD Ameritrade Portfolios.

The app supports client accounts utilizing Essential Portfolios, an automated, low-cost advisory service for digital-first investors that launched Nov. 1, 2016, as well as an existing managed account offering, Selective Portfolios (which was formerly known as Amerivest Portfolios). It is currently in a pilot before its official launch in January 2017.

“For clients who can’t access our mobile apps, they can use their browser to place orders, get quotes, view charts, track market news, and manage all of their accounts in a clean and simple mobile browser,” said Rebecca Niiya, a TD Ameritrade spokesperson. “The TD Ameritrade Portfolios app provides managed account clients with more detail in a simple, streamlined way, including: their goals, target amount and progress toward their long-term goal(s), probability of reaching their targets, as well as gains and losses.

“Plus, the app is customized to display charts that provide insight into the historical performance and hypothetical projections of their account.”

TD Ameritrade Portfolios
The first version of the app is currently available for Apple iPhone devices, with the launch of the Android app and additional upgrades and features planned for the first half of 2017.

The app will be a separate property from TD Ameritrade’s suite of mobile offerings, which include TD Ameritrade Mobile Trader, which allows users to trade stocks, ETFs, multi-leg options, futures and options on futures; and the TD Ameritrade mobile app, which allows users to manage their accounts and place trades.

The TD Ameritrade Portfolios app is its first app geared towards long-term investors with managed accounts.

TD Ameritrade also recently introduced the TD Ameritrade Skill for Amazon Alexa. Users can ask Alexa for the latest market update, or a stock, fund or index quote to receive timely, accurate information for over 75,000 symbols, all through Amazon Alexa’s voice recognition software.

Mobile trading
Last year, TD Ameritrade followed up on the 124 percent uptick in trading on mobile devices by offering users of its Mobile Trader application the ability to connect to a service representative and text for help without leaving the app (see story).

And, despite recent market hesitation concerning wearables, there was a time when even a brokerage firm such as TD Ameritrade was eyeing the platform. It expanded its multichannel user experience onto the Apple Watch to create a seamless experience for its customers and help them get the most out the company’s mobile services (see story).

“We leverage technology to improve people’s financial lives, and the capacity of technology to help us do that has never been more powerful,” Ms. Niiya said. “Our growing client engagement with mobile shows that mobile access to their investment portfolios is very much a part of staying engaged with the markets and making trades.

Mobile is the platform of the future; twenty-two percent of our clients’ trades are placed via mobile devices, and one in five new account openings came from a mobile device in 2016,” she said. “And, the younger the investor, the more mobile-inclined they tend to be: in our recent collegiate-level trading competition, the thinkorswim Challenge, 36 percent of trades were placed via mobile devices.

“We’re proud to be the leader in mobile trading and with that we feel a responsibility to deliver a better experience for our clients. We’re continually working to give traders and investors the most robust, yet streamlined mobile experience.”