By Ranga Srinivasan and Ramprasad Satagopan

A Message From Everest

As we head into the holiday season, we at Everest Management would like to reflect back on the progress we have made in 2024. We would like to start by expressing our heartfelt gratitude to all our clients who have entrusted us the responsibility to be stewards of their hard-earned wealth. The financial markets have had another exceptional year, which brings peace and cheer to the families we serve and us as their advisors. 

Since our inception, we have continually looked to add more value and expand our service offering to benefit our clients, and 2024 has been no different.

Our Growth in Numbers

Key Service Enhancements in 2024 

  • Tax-advantaged index investments for clients using Separately Managed Accounts (SMA) and adding Morgan Stanley as a second vendor for exchange funds to exchange concentrated company stock and diversify into a broader index like the S&P 500.
  • Income solutions for retirees using Net Lease Private Real Estate funds that yield 6-7% in a tax-deferred manner.
  • Private market investments in private credit, secondary venture capital, and structured credit investments. These target a higher rate of return than what’s normally available in the public stock and bond markets, while also reducing volatility.
  • Shielding portfolios against deep down markets through a small allocation to a trend following/managed futures fund.
  • Improved estate planning through irrevocable trusts and private placement life insurance. 
  • Private placement variable annuity usage for families that want to create more tax-advantaged space (like what’s available in their 401(k)).
  • Defined benefits pension plans for business owners who want to defer more of their salary beyond what’s possible through 401(k) plans.

Service Enhancements Through Technology Upgrades

  • To provide a best-in-class fintech experience, we transitioned our performance reporting solution to the industry’s leading SAAS vendor Black Diamond. In addition to streamlined quarterly performance reporting, clients now have access to a more granular analysis of their investments. If you haven’t already accessed your accounts through Black Diamond, please reach out to one of us.
  • As we deliver more value to clients, the complexity of our investment solution keeps increasing. We had to make continual enhancement of our custom portfolio management software to support many nuances of supporting asset allocation, and automatic trading for alternative asset classes and estate planning accounts.
  • We also licensed customer relationship management (CRM) software from RedTail Technology, a leading SAAS vendor. This should allow Everest to better scale client-specific initiatives.

Continuing Education

We continue to be active in the area of continuing education. We attended several conferences in 2024, including:

  • Notre Dame Tax & Estate Planning Institute (South Bend, Indiana) 
  • Citywire RIA Summit (Austin, Texas)
  • CAZ Investments Summit (Houston, Texas)
  • CAIS Alternative Investment Summit (New York)
  • DeVoe M&A+ Succession Summit (San Francisco, California)
  • AQR Symposium (San Francisco, California)
  • Source50 Summit (Scottsdale, Arizona)

Charitable Giving 

We have been working with some of you to include charitable giving through donor-advised funds (DAFs). Giving influences the society in positive ways, and can be rewarding emotionally while also saving you on taxes. No matter what your goals are, there are ways to optimize the process. 

Examples

  • For one-time donation: Cash donations are okay, but donating appreciated securities is ideal.
  • To give throughout the year: Set up a donor-advised fund with stocks or cash. 
  • Retirees wanting to do more: Use QCDs and designate charities as beneficiaries of IRAs.
  • Combine legacy planning and charity: Set up charitable trusts (CRUTs and CRATs).

Everest has gained proficiency in this area through our partner firms, so please feel free to schedule a discussion on how you can take advantage of these solutions. 

Looking Ahead to 2025

Our goals for the next year continue to be the same—expand the service offering and improve the financial outcomes for our clients. We have identified several items on our road map for 2025, in topics ranging from tax planning and estate planning to additional investment opportunities in both the public and private markets.

Stay Connected

We encourage our clients to schedule annual reviews with us, so we can go over details of the solution we have in place for you. It will also be a great opportunity to discuss elements of our service offerings that have been enhanced, and how you can take advantage of it. Everest has grown primarily through the referrals and introductions provided by our clients. We are deeply appreciative of your support and hope you keep us in mind when financial conversations take place with your friends and family. 

About Ranga

Ranga Srinivasan is co-founder and principal at Everest Management Corp, an SEC-registered wealth advisory firm based in Silicon Valley and serving clients across the United States. After graduating from the University of Cincinnati in the field of engineering, Ranga, witnessed the dot-com collapse in the early 2000s and sought to manage his own personal finances. He realized that many of the options available were unsatisfactory for a myriad of reasons. Knowing it could be done better, Everest was founded in 2007 to provide comprehensive wealth management. Ranga and the Everest team are dedicated to caring for the financial needs of the families they serve. With an emphasis on building trust and holding to the fiduciary standard of putting clients first, Ranga strives to offer financial solutions that inspire confidence. 

In his free time, Ranga is passionate about staying active; you can often find him swimming, golfing, biking, and playing tennis. He also has a great love for charity and philanthropy work. To learn more about Ranga, connect with him on LinkedIn.

About Ramprasad

Ramprasad Satagopan is co-founder and principal at Everest Management Corp, an SEC-registered wealth advisory firm based in Silicon Valley and serving clients across the United States. As a self-made, highly educated first-generation immigrant, Ramprasad became passionate about investing after witnessing the dot-com collapse in the early 2000s. He created Everest to help his peer engineering community to build household wealth in a systematic way. Everest has grown over the years while staying true to its fiduciary commitment. Ramprasad and the Everest team take pride in being a firm that brings a reputable, honest, and caring approach to all its clients.

Ramprasad graduated from both the University of Cincinnati and the University of Phoenix with a master’s degree in science and business administration, respectively. When he’s not helping families build a strong financial future, Ramprasad can be found enjoying traveling and reading. To learn more about Ramprasad, connect with him on LinkedIn.

Disclosures

Everest Management Corp. is a registered investment advisor. Information in this message is for the intended recipient[s] only. Everest Management Corp. often communicates with its clients and prospective clients through email and other electronic means. Your privacy and security are very important to us. Everest Management Corp. makes every effort to ensure that email communications do not contain sensitive information. If you are not the intended recipient of this communication, please delete and destroy all copies in your possession, notify the sender that you have received this communication in error, and note that any review or dissemination of, or the taking of any action in reliance on, this communication is expressly prohibited. We remind our clients and others not to send Everest Management Corp. private information over email. If you have sensitive data to deliver, we can provide secure means for such delivery. Please note Everest Management Corp. does not accept trading or money movement instructions via email. Please visit our website everest-mgmt.com for important disclosures.

The information provided is for educational and informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice and it should not be relied on as such. It should not be considered a solicitation to buy or an offer to sell a security. It does not take into account any investor’s particular investment objectives, strategies, tax status or investment horizon. You should consult your attorney or tax advisor.

The views expressed in this commentary are subject to change based on market and other conditions. These views may contain certain statements that may be deemed forward‐looking statements. Please note that any such statements are not guarantees of any future performance and actual results or developments may differ materially from those projected. Any projections, market outlooks, or estimates are based upon certain assumptions and should not be construed as indicative of actual events that will occur.

No investment strategy or risk management technique can guarantee returns or eliminate risk in any market environment. All investments include a risk of loss that clients should be prepared to bear. The principal risks of Everest Management Corp. strategies are disclosed in the publicly available Form ADV Part 2A. 

Everest Management Corp. is a registered investment advisor. Advisory services are only offered to clients or prospective clients where Everest Management Corp. and its representatives are properly licensed or exempt from licensure.