You used to need at least $10 million in investible assets to draw the attention of wealth managers at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Now, all it takes is $1,000 and a smartphone.
The Wall Street firm on Tuesday is set to unveil Marcus Invest, a low-cost digital platform that allocates and automatically rebalances individuals’ wealth across portfolios of stocks and bonds based on the models developed by the firm’s investment-strategy committee.
Marcus Invest will be tucked into Goldman’s existing Marcus consumer-banking app and website. The offering will help round out a somewhat disjointed set of Goldman banking products, which include savings accounts, unsecured personal loans and budgeting software that carry the Marcus brand and a credit card with Apple Inc. that doesn’t.
With Marcus Invest and a forthcoming Marcus checking account, “we get to the point where we can be someone’s primary banking relationship, meaning we can be the digital bank on your phone,” said Stephanie Cohen, who was promoted to global co-head of Goldman’s consumer and wealth-management division in September after a stint as the bank’s strategy chief.
Among the beta testers for the Marcus Invest app was Chief Executive David Solomon. Under Mr. Solomon, Goldman has de-emphasized riskier activities like trading bonds and derivatives in favor of Marcus and other more predictable businesses preferred by investors.
