Trading in paper for electrons — that is what J.P. Morgan Asset Management has done with its “Guide to the Markets” quarterly report.
Specifically, the firm has migrated and morphed the popular 7-by-51/2-inch spiral-bound quarterly report into an iPad application of the same name.
In paper form, the guide has been in production since 2004 and recently has been printed at a rate of about 90,000 copies per quarter. It is sent free to financial advisers who work with the firm.
“Like many other financial services firms, we have noted very high numbers of advisers using the iPad,” said Marlene DeLuca, global head of insights for J.P. Morgan Asset Management.
“Many an adviser has come to know and love — and look for — particular recurring charts each quarter,” she said of those appearing in the guide, which averages 60 pages an issue.
Those static charts, along with all the other paper content, are taking on more of a life of their own in the form of content that is more interactive.
The guide is already available electronically in PDF form on the second day of every quarter, but these versions are still largely static.
“We are really going to be able to extend the use of what is in the guide by sharing it within the iPad app. You can in some ways liken this as really a home page to the guide, a set of short snippets to jump off from,” said Ms. DeLuca, who has been working on the guide since 2005.
“If I just quickly wanted to see what I could use on emerging-markets commentary, I might be overwhelmed at first glance with 50 pages on the topic,” she said.
KICKING THE TIRES
I recently had a chance to kick the tires on the app for a few days.
It is very easy to navigate, and users can easily maneuver through the slides by scrolling.
Stopping on a particular slide, users will find additional options. For example, there is audio commentary for each one. Simply click “listen to slide audio,” which the firm has recorded of its own strategists.
It is easy these days to share parts of a guide with clients in person, as many advisers do, and if something in particular strikes their fancy, they can easily e-mail a PDF version of those pages from inside the app.
Now, there are still things I find not quite intuitive. For example, I spent a moment or two puzzling over the “slide view,” versus “detail view,” at the top of the screen in the app.
To my mind, “detail view” would refer to the larger, full-screen view of a slide, but in actuality, this is the “slide view.”
The “detail view” presents users with the detailed things one can do with the slide, such as “add to my collections” (basically, a repository of content users select), “send to ...” for sending to a client or colleague, and “listen to slide audio.”
J.P. Morgan also has wiggle room here to add true interactivity to the slides to bring them alive.
I know the underlying architecture, HTML5, can support it. So, for example, if a user wanted to zoom in on a particular trough or peak in a chart, J.P. Morgan could have additional pop-up content.
Don't get me wrong. J.P. Morgan is doing plenty in the way of static call-outs to explain things on the screen itself, but these are static and could be made interactive.
And perhaps some of this is being worked in. J.P. Morgan allowed me to take a test spin of my own on a demonstration server prior to the launch.
For the moment, though, my favorite iPad app from a fund company meant for adviser usage remains AllianceBernstein LP's AB Connect iPad app, which was rolled out in December.
It has a bit more interactivity, and the iteration with the firm's blog keeps what the firm is sharing a bit fresher.
There are also quite a few “interactive tools” associated with the app that advisers can download into it through updates. These tools make use of Javascript and real-time web technologies allowing the user to take advantage of the screen to drag and see changes on a chart.
One example is the “fixed-income roll calculator.”
Just food for thought. Nothing on the web is carved in stone, after all.
Every adviser with a relationship allowing access should check out the J.P. Morgan Insight App. The price is certainly right, and it is chock full of information.
Advisers who sell J.P. Morgan funds likely will be getting some tutoring soon, if they haven't already, from their friendly company wholesaler.
