The mandate
The family office of Hamilton James, Jefferson River Capital, has been investing across public and private markets, building a diverse portfolio spanning traditional assets, alternative investments, and complex estate entities. This complexity, coupled with a small team, made tracking and reporting a significant challenge.
“I would say politely, there’s not an investment type or structure that we don’t own somehow. So, we needed a system and a platform that could manage liquid and illiquid, straightforward and non-straightforward, and a very complicated estate entity.” – Dan Forman, CIO at Jefferson River Capital.
Upon joining Jefferson River Capital as CIO in 2022, Dan Forman’s mandate was clear: “Invest, get the house in order, but build a world-class, small and nimble infrastructure. And the portfolio management system is the key to that.”
The criteria
Jefferson River Capital sought a technology solution that met four critical criteria:
- Customisable – The ability to tailor investment groupings and categorisations to align with their specific investment philosophy.
- Secure – Robust security protocols to ensure the confidentiality of sensitive client data.
- Aggregation – Comprehensive visualisation of net worth and balance sheet data.
- Support – On-demand technical support to complement the firm’s small investment team.
“We use a couple of other platforms, but with those, we don’t have a representative who is consistently reaching out to us on a weekly basis, setting up meetings, talking through what our problems are and resolving issues, so I appreciate that with Masttro.” – Mitch Nevin – Senior Investment Analyst at Jefferson River Capital.
Why Masttro?
Jefferson River Capital selected Masttro for its ability to address its complex tracking and reporting needs. The platform offered a comprehensive overview of all assets and provided the necessary support for their lean team. Below are the ways in which Masttro impacted their day-to-day operations:
Single source of truth
Masttro provided a unified dashboard for a complete view of the firm’s net worth across all asset classes, enabling real-time performance tracking of alternative assets.
Simplified onboarding
With proper training and support from Masttro, the team found the implementation simple: “Once we understood Masttro and got the necessary training, uploading our portfolio was seamless,” says Mitch Nevin.
In just three months, they successfully uploaded and began monitoring over 200 alternative investments. Additionally, Masttro’s AI document automation feature significantly reduced manual effort by automating crucial processes such as document collection, classification, and analysis.
Military-grade security/span>
The platform features military-grade security measures to ensure complete data protection. It uses advanced encryption protocols to safeguard sensitive financial information and offers customised access controls to effectively manage internal permissions. Even Masttro employees don’t have access.
Final results
Since implementing Masttro, Jefferson River Capital has seen significant benefits. As Forman points out, the platform’s user-friendly interface makes it easy to add assets and visualise family mappings. The small investment team can now efficiently track, manage, and report on their diverse and complex portfolio. This efficiency allows them to focus more on strategic investment decisions that will benefit them for many more decades to come.
“Masttro has allowed us to have a single source of truth for all of our investments, which is critical and enables us to execute a world-class, institutional quality middle office infrastructure,” says Dan Forman.
The responses in this case study have been verified by the Simple team.