Description of Firm
DWD Portfolio Solutions, Inc. is a registered investment adviser primarily based in Pittsburgh, PA.
DWD Portfolio Solutions was created in 1994. Our principal owners are:
• Sam D'Alesandro Chief Executive Officer/CCO
• Carla Devlin, President/Chief Investment Officer
• Keith Woerner, Executive Vice President/General Counsel
As used in this brochure, the words "the Company," “(the) firm,” "we," "our," and "us" refer to DWD
Portfolio Solutions, Inc. and the words "you," "your," and "client" refer to you as either a client or
prospective client of our firm.
Types of Advisory Services
Portfolio Management Services
DWD offers discretionary and non-discretionary portfolio management services. Our investment advice
is tailored to meet our clients' needs and investment objectives.
If you participate in our discretionary portfolio management services, we require you to grant us
discretionary authority to manage your account. Subject to a grant of discretionary authorization, we
have the authority and responsibility to formulate investment strategies on your behalf. Discretionary
authorization will allow us to determine the specific securities, and the amount of securities, to be
purchased or sold for your account without obtaining your approval prior to each transaction.
Discretionary authority is typically granted by the investment advisory agreement you sign with our
firm, a power of attorney, or trading authorization forms.
You may limit our discretionary authority (for example, limiting the types of securities that can be
purchased or sold for your account) by providing our firm with your restrictions and guidelines in
writing.
We also offer non-discretionary portfolio management services. If you enter into non-discretionary
arrangements with our firm, we must obtain your approval prior to executing any transactions on behalf
of your account. You have an unrestricted right to decline to implement any advice provided by our firm
on a non-discretionary basis.
As part of our portfolio management services, we may use one or more sub-advisers to manage a
portion of your account on a discretionary basis. The sub-adviser(s) may use one or more of their
model portfolios to manage your account. We will regularly monitor the performance of your accounts
managed by sub-adviser(s) and may hire and fire any sub-adviser without your prior approval. We
may pay a portion of our advisory fee to the sub-adviser(s) we use; however, you will not pay our firm a
higher advisory fee as a result of any sub-advisory relationships.
As part of our portfolio management services, in addition to other types of investments (see
disclosures below in this section), we may invest your assets according to one or more model
portfolios developed by an unaffiliated investment manager. These models are designed for investors
with varying degrees of risk tolerance ranging from a more aggressive investment strategy to a more
conservative investment approach. Clients whose assets are invested in model portfolios may not set
restrictions on the specific holdings or allocations within the model, nor the types of securities that can
be purchased in the model. Nonetheless, clients may impose restrictions on investing in certain
securities or types of securities in their account. In such cases, this may prevent a client from
investing in certain models that are managed by our firm.
Financial Planning
Financial planning is intended to assist clients with long term goal planning based on an evaluation of
a client’s current and future financial state. Topics we address as part of the financial planning process
may include, but are not limited to, risk assessment/management, investment planning, financial
organization, and financial decision making/negotiation. DWD does not provide tax advice but may
recommend certain tax planning strategies. We recommend that you consult with a qualified tax
professional before initiating any tax planning strategies. Any reports, financial statement projections,
and analyses are intended exclusively for your use in developing and implementing your financial plan.
In view of this limited purpose, the projections should not be considered a complete financial plan.
DWD Portfolio Solutions will not audit, review, or compile financial statements and, accordingly, we will
not express an opinion or other form of assurance on them, including the reasonableness of
assumptions and other data on which any prospective financial statements are based. It is likely that
there will be material differences between projected and actual results because events vary and
circumstances frequently do not occur as expected.
Our analyses will be highly dependent on certain economic assumptions about the future. Therefore,
you should establish familiarity with historical data regarding key assumptions such as inflation and
investment rates of return, as well as an understanding of how significantly these assumptions affect
the results of our analyses. We may counsel you as to the consistency of your assumptions with
relevant historical data, but we will not express any assurance as to the accuracy or reasonableness of
your specific data and assumptions. You are ultimately responsible for the assumptions and personal
data upon which our procedures and projections are based. The financial plan assumptions and
reports are primarily a tool to alert you to certain possibilities. The reports are not intended to, nor do
they provide any guarantee about future events including your investment returns. The implementation
of the plan is solely your responsibility.
Participant Account Management
We use a third-party platform to facilitate management of held away assets such as defined
contribution plan (401k, 403b etc.) participant accounts, with discretion. We are not affiliated with the
platform in any way and receive no compensation from them for using their platform. Based on our
review of the account allocations, we will rebalance the account when appropriate considering client
investment goals and risk tolerance, and any change in allocations will consider current economic
and market trends.
Institutional Intelligent PortfoliosTM
Where deemed appropriate, certain investment management services may be provided by the
company to its wealth management clients through Institutional Intelligent PortfoliosTM, a digital
technology solution offered through Schwab Performance Technologies (the “Program”). We use the
Institutional Intelligent Portfolios® platform (“Platform”), offered by Schwab Performance
Technologies (“SPT”), a software provider to independent investment advisors and an affiliate of
Schwab to operate the Program. Clients’ portfolios are held in a brokerage account opened by the
client at Schwab through its Institutional Intelligent Portfolios (IIP) platform. DWD is independent of
and not owned by, affiliated with, or sponsored or supervised by Schwab or its affiliates.
Through the Program, the company offers a range of investment strategies the firm has constructed
and manages. Each strategy consists of a portfolio of exchange-traded funds
(“ETFs”) and a cash
allocation in accordance with the investment objectives of the client. The company is the client’s
investment advisor and primary point of contact with respect to the Program and is responsible for
determining the appropriateness of the Program for the client as well as choosing a suitable
investment strategy and portfolio on an ongoing basis.
Additional information regarding brokerage practices and conflicts of interest relating to the Program
are described in Item 12 below.
Pension Consulting Services
We offer pension consulting services to employee benefit plans and their fiduciaries based upon the
needs of the plan and the services requested by the plan sponsor or named fiduciary. In general, these
services may include an existing plan review and analysis, plan-level advice regarding fund selection
and investment options. These pension consulting services will generally be non-discretionary and
advisory in nature. The ultimate decision to act on behalf of the plan shall remain with the plan sponsor
or other named fiduciary.
We may also provide additional types of pension consulting services to plans on an individually
negotiated basis. All services, whether discussed above or customized for the plan based upon
requirements from the plan fiduciaries (which may include additional plan-level or participant-level
services) shall be detailed in a written agreement and be consistent with the parameters set forth in the
plan documents.
Either party to the pension consulting agreement may terminate the agreement upon written notice to
the other party in accordance with the terms of the agreement for services. The pension consulting
fees will be prorated for the quarter in which the termination notice is given and any unearned fees will
be refunded to the client.
Educational Seminars
On occasion, we may offer educational workshops or seminars regarding personal finance, financial
literacy, and other related areas.
Wrap Fee Programs
We do not participate in any wrap fee program.
Types of Investments Used
We consider many different types of securities when formulating the investment advice we will give to
you. If you come to us with existing investments, we evaluate them with respect to your financial goals,
risk tolerance, and investment time horizon. Depending upon your situation, your account(s) managed
by us may contain individual stocks, corporate and/or government bonds, government securities,
mutual funds, variable annuities, variable life insurance, or exchange traded funds ("ETFs").
Non-correlated Investments
We may invest a portion of your portfolios in non-correlated mutual funds or ETFs. Non-correlated
mutual funds or ETFs may rise in value while the general stock market declines and vice versa. We
may add these non-correlated mutual funds or ETFs in an attempt to reduce the volatility of your
portfolio. The addition of non-correlated investments does not in any way guarantee that the volatility,
draw down, or loss of portfolio principal will be lower and it may actually reduce long-term portfolio
performance.
Tailored Services and Investment Restrictions
Our goal is to tailor your investment portfolio to your financial situation as you have described it to us.
As such, we will consult with you periodically to determine any updates to your risk tolerance, time
horizon or other factors that may impact your investment portfolio. You may impose restrictions on
investing in certain securities or types of securities. You must clearly identify these restrictions in
writing to us. DWD will notify you if we are unable to accommodate any requests.
IRA Rollover Recommendations
Investors considering rolling over assets from a qualified employer-sponsored retirement plan
(“Employer Plan”) to an Individual Retirement Account (“IRA”) should review and consider the
advantages and disadvantages of an IRA rollover from their Employer Plan. A plan participant leaving
an employer typically has four options (and can engage in a combination of these options):
(1) Leave the money in the former employer’s plan, if permitted;
(2) Rollover the assets to a new employer’s plan (if available and rollovers are permitted);
(3) Rollover Employer Plan assets to an IRA; or,
(4) Cash out the Employer Plan assets and pay the required taxes on the distribution.
At a minimum, Investors should consider fees and expenses, investment options, services, penalty-free
withdrawals, protection from creditors and legal judgments, required minimum distributions, and
employer stock. We encourage you to discuss your options and review the above-listed considerations
with an accountant, third-party administrator, investment adviser to your Employer Plan (if available), or
legal counsel, to the extent you consider necessary.
By recommending that you rollover your Employer Plan assets to an IRA advised by us, we will earn
fees as a result. We have an economic incentive to encourage investors to rollover Employer Plan
assets into an IRA managed by us. Investors can face increased fees when they move retirement
assets from an Employer Plan to a Rollover IRA account. Even if there are no costs associated with
the IRA rollover itself, there will be costs associated with account administration, investment
management, or both. In addition to the fees charged by us, the underlying investment (mutual fund,
ETF, annuity, or other investment) can also include fees. Custodial and trading fees also apply.
Investing in an IRA with us will typically be more expensive than an Employer Plan.
Effective December 20, 2021 (or such later date as the US Department of Labor (“DOL”) Field
Assistance Bulletin 2018-02 ceases to be in effect), for purposes of complying with the DOL’s
Prohibited Transaction Exemption 2020-02 (“PTE 2020-02”) where applicable, we are providing the
following acknowledgment to you.
When we provide investment advice to you regarding your retirement plan account or individual
retirement account, we are fiduciaries within the meaning of Title I of the Employee Retirement Income
Security Act and/or the Internal Revenue Code, as applicable, which are laws governing retirement
accounts. The way we make money creates some conflicts with your interests, so we operate under a
special rule that requires us to act in your best interest and not put our interest ahead of yours. Under
this special rule’s provisions, we must:
• Meet a professional standard of care when making investment recommendations (give
prudent advice);
• Never put our financial interests ahead of yours when making recommendations (give loyal
advice);
• Avoid misleading statements about conflicts of interest, fees, and investments;
• Follow policies and procedures designed to ensure that we give advice that is in your best
interest;
• Charge no more than is reasonable for our services; and
• Give you basic information about conflicts of interest.
Assets Under Management
As of December 31, 2023, we provide continuous management services for $1,075,669 in client
assets on a non-discretionary basis and $185,147,498 on a discretionary basis.