Ally Financial announced the launch of a new wealth management offering, which provides access to human advisors, rather than robo advisors, for clients with more than $100,000 in investable assets.

Why should we care?
Ally says that by placing the threshold at $100,000, rather than the standard $250,000 for access to human advisors, it’s democratizing access to personal financial advice. “Our new wealth management offering makes dedicated, holistic human advisory more accessible by lowering the barriers to entry,” said Diane Morais, President of Consumer and Commercial Banking at Ally. One could poke holes in that rhetoric to an extent—but it’s maybe more productive to emphasize what this new push signals about the continued need for human advisors. It seems banking can’t get away with automating its most valuable asset: its relationship with clients. It might not scale that human touch to every consumer, but this hiring decision proves that automation may render some old-school jobs obsolete, but certainly not all of them, and some roles, like advisory positions, may actually grow as banking access expands.