Not a model you're sorted into, not a product someone earns a commission to sell you. A portfolio built around your plan — its material decisions recorded with a reason and a name.
"If we can't say why a position is there, it shouldn't be."
Most portfolios are assembled and then explained. A risk questionnaire sorts you into a model, the model is implemented, and the rationale is reverse-engineered if you ever ask. The trades are real; the reasoning is decorative. We work the other way around. The plan of record comes first — what this money is for, when you'll need it, what you can't afford to lose — and the portfolio is built to serve it.
Positions are selected to serve the plan. Allocation, rebalancing, tax-loss harvesting, holding through a drawdown, and trimming a concentrated position may each involve a material investment decision. Those material decisions are recorded with their rationale and date, and attributed to a named person where applicable.
The result isn't a flashier portfolio. It's an accountable one — where performance is measured against your plan and an honest benchmark, net of every fee, with nothing rounded into a more flattering number.
Three people. You know everyone who touches your portfolio — and the people who wrote your plan are the ones managing against it.
Two giants. Assets held at Charles Schwab and Fidelity Investments — among the largest custodians in the world. They hold; we direct.
An army of institutional managers on Adhesion Wealth's platform — roughly five thousand strategies we select from and combine into a portfolio built for your plan, your taxes, your risk.
Most firms sort you into "moderate" or "aggressive" from a questionnaire and hope the label holds. We measure risk instead. Using Nitrogen, we translate your capacity for loss into a single Risk Number — a plain 1-to-99 reading of how much volatility your plan can actually bear — and give your portfolio its own number the same way.
The discipline is keeping the two in agreement. Every portfolio is built to sit inside your comfort range, and BAFAos checks the gap at every desk-initiated reading — when a rally or a drawdown pushes the portfolio's risk out of alignment with yours, it flags for a tax-aware correction. That reading is the Risk Alignment dimension of your Health Score — see the Health Score page for how this reading is verified.
A number you agreed to — not a temperament we assigned you.
Chapter II of your folio. Reviewed at the desk, corrected at every review.
The mix of assets is derived from your plan of record — your goals, horizon, and capacity for loss, measured as a Nitrogen risk score rather than guessed from a questionnaire. The portfolio exists to fund the plan, so it’s shaped by the plan — and checked against the number.
Drift is measured against the policy targets and corrected on a defined discipline — not on a hunch, and not by neglect. Each rebalance is logged as a decision with the drift that triggered it.
Asset location, lot selection, and harvest timing are coordinated with your tax picture so returns are kept after tax, not just before it. We surface the trade-off; you and your CPA make the call.
Performance is reported net of every fee, against a benchmark that actually matches your allocation — not a flattering index. A return we can’t reconcile is shown as unknown, never dressed up.
Your assets sit at an independent qualified custodian. We have the authority to manage them — and none to take them.
Intellicapital takes no physical possession of client funds; limited deemed custody (fee deduction, standing authorizations) is disclosed in Form ADV. Your assets are held at independent qualified custodians — currently Charles Schwab & Co., Inc. and Fidelity Investments, depending on platform and account structure. We direct, document, and reconcile; the custodian holds the money and reports to you directly.
You can verify every position at the source, on the custodian’s own statements.
We trade and rebalance under a limited power; we cannot withdraw your assets to ourselves.
The firm’s record is tied out against the custodian’s, with breaks surfaced — not smoothed over.
Account structure determines the custodian and platform — Adhesion Wealth at Schwab, AssetMark at Fidelity, Pontera for held-away retirement accounts — all disclosed up front.
Trade confirmations show what happened. The firm retains material investment decisions with their rationale, date, and reviewer where applicable. The Claims Register describes which linkage and artifact-binding controls operate today and which remain governed build targets.
Material investment decisions are recorded in plain English, dated, and attributed to a named person where applicable.
Positions, performance, and fees are reconciled to custodian records and reported through the folio. Richer end-to-end decision lineage remains a governed build target.
The allocation is checked against the plan of record at the annual review, drift corrected, and the record signed forward.
Bring your current portfolio. We'll tell you what each piece is doing for your plan — and what it's costing you — even if you never hire us.
Book a Call →