In a world inundated with both information and misinformation, access to the right financial advice is more essential than ever. Millennials and Gen Zs are actively taking part in controlling their finances and are open to seeking professional advice rather than relying on just pre-planned financial services and products. The shift, experts say, has resulted from the pandemic, which disrupted business globally, causing major financial challenges for many.
After observing the fragmented and impersonal nature of financial planning in India, which is often influenced by sales incentives, Priyank Shah and Vatsal Majithia started The Financialist in Mumbai in 2020.
“After completing my CA, the Covid-19 pandemic created space for deeper conversations with people around their finances. During these discussions, my co-founder, Vatsal, and I noticed a recurring gap—people were being sold financial products, not genuine advice. Even within my own family, I saw this firsthand. My father held multiple traditional insurance policies that neither offered sufficient returns nor adequate risk protection,” Shah said.
He noted that people relied on different service providers to meet their distinct financial needs—one for investments, another for insurance, and yet another for taxes—resulting in a lack of cohesive strategy tying it all together. That’s when they decided to build a company that would bring every aspect of personal finance under one roof.
The Financialist operates as a digital family office, offering a comprehensive suite of financial services. These services span investment solutions, insurance, tax planning, loan optimisation, and retirement planning, among others. The company offers a personalised service model, where each client is paired with a dedicated team of CAs, CFAs, and advisors.
Talking about how the company stands out in a sea of various financial planning providers, Shah, who is also the Co-founder & CEO of The Financialist, said that their model fundamentally differs from the norm by working on a fixed fee, which ensures that there is no need for pushing products.
“We go above and beyond to ensure that the advice is free from all conflict by charging a fee that is dependent on the annual income of the client and not on a percentage of assets under our advisory. All advice given is hyper-personalised and aimed at solving specific client goals. What makes it convenient for our clients is having us as a one-stop solution for all their personal finance needs,” he said.
The Financialist's clientele list includes salaried working professionals, top athletes, creators, founders, and CXOs, across India, as well as NRIs. The Financialist refused to disclose their number of clients.
Shah explained that the company uses technology to reduce friction. Its onboarding process is powered by the account aggregator framework, which automatically fetches their customers’ existing financial data all into one place after acquiring their consent through an OTP. One of the major bottlenecks in this industry is getting access to multiple documents from a client for making a comprehensive financial plan.
“Often, clients don’t have all the required documents handy, or they have a high inertia to collate the documents and send them to us. This created dependency on clients and delayed the overall financial planning process. Our dashboard also lets clients view their entire portfolio in a single snapshot. We are also in the process of building some tools that will help in curating financial plans and make them more comprehensive,” he said.
Vijay Mani, Partner, Banking & Capital Markets Leader, Deloitte India, said that a number of diverse service providers are emerging in India. These range from providers with the conventional relationship manager model (typically aimed at affluent customers) to digital models aimed at mass affluent or even mass market customers. “There is significant growth in retail investor participation in the equities and mutual fund markets, and alongside that, a growing need for well-tailored investment advisory services,” he said.
Mani also added that the biggest challenge here is that the quality of financial advisory services (including raising financial awareness and literacy) is significantly dependent on the training and performance of financial planners and relationship managers. “This poses a scalability challenge for the future and a service quality issue at present. There is a need to use technology more effectively to assure consistent service quality and realise scale potential,” he said.
For The Financialist, building trust remains a great challenge in financial services. Things often revolve around selling products rather than helping people plan their financial lives. “The industry still focuses on selling products to customers over providing genuine advice. We want to shift the narrative from ‘which mutual fund?’ to ‘what do you want your money to do for you?’, essentially solving for mis-selling,” Shah said.
The company refused to disclose their revenue. According to data from Tracxn, The Financialist clocked a revenue of Rs 1.07 crore in FY24 with a net profit of Rs 19.9 lakh. The Financialist is backed by Rainmatter Foundation. This year, the company is planning to grow its NRI base and launch new planning tools.
After observing the fragmented and impersonal nature of financial planning in India, which is often influenced by sales incentives, Priyank Shah and Vatsal Majithia started The Financialist in Mumbai in 2020.
“After completing my CA, the Covid-19 pandemic created space for deeper conversations with people around their finances. During these discussions, my co-founder, Vatsal, and I noticed a recurring gap—people were being sold financial products, not genuine advice. Even within my own family, I saw this firsthand. My father held multiple traditional insurance policies that neither offered sufficient returns nor adequate risk protection,” Shah said.
He noted that people relied on different service providers to meet their distinct financial needs—one for investments, another for insurance, and yet another for taxes—resulting in a lack of cohesive strategy tying it all together. That’s when they decided to build a company that would bring every aspect of personal finance under one roof.
The Financialist operates as a digital family office, offering a comprehensive suite of financial services. These services span investment solutions, insurance, tax planning, loan optimisation, and retirement planning, among others. The company offers a personalised service model, where each client is paired with a dedicated team of CAs, CFAs, and advisors.
Talking about how the company stands out in a sea of various financial planning providers, Shah, who is also the Co-founder & CEO of The Financialist, said that their model fundamentally differs from the norm by working on a fixed fee, which ensures that there is no need for pushing products.
“We go above and beyond to ensure that the advice is free from all conflict by charging a fee that is dependent on the annual income of the client and not on a percentage of assets under our advisory. All advice given is hyper-personalised and aimed at solving specific client goals. What makes it convenient for our clients is having us as a one-stop solution for all their personal finance needs,” he said.
The Financialist's clientele list includes salaried working professionals, top athletes, creators, founders, and CXOs, across India, as well as NRIs. The Financialist refused to disclose their number of clients.
Shah explained that the company uses technology to reduce friction. Its onboarding process is powered by the account aggregator framework, which automatically fetches their customers’ existing financial data all into one place after acquiring their consent through an OTP. One of the major bottlenecks in this industry is getting access to multiple documents from a client for making a comprehensive financial plan.
“Often, clients don’t have all the required documents handy, or they have a high inertia to collate the documents and send them to us. This created dependency on clients and delayed the overall financial planning process. Our dashboard also lets clients view their entire portfolio in a single snapshot. We are also in the process of building some tools that will help in curating financial plans and make them more comprehensive,” he said.
Vijay Mani, Partner, Banking & Capital Markets Leader, Deloitte India, said that a number of diverse service providers are emerging in India. These range from providers with the conventional relationship manager model (typically aimed at affluent customers) to digital models aimed at mass affluent or even mass market customers. “There is significant growth in retail investor participation in the equities and mutual fund markets, and alongside that, a growing need for well-tailored investment advisory services,” he said.
Mani also added that the biggest challenge here is that the quality of financial advisory services (including raising financial awareness and literacy) is significantly dependent on the training and performance of financial planners and relationship managers. “This poses a scalability challenge for the future and a service quality issue at present. There is a need to use technology more effectively to assure consistent service quality and realise scale potential,” he said.
For The Financialist, building trust remains a great challenge in financial services. Things often revolve around selling products rather than helping people plan their financial lives. “The industry still focuses on selling products to customers over providing genuine advice. We want to shift the narrative from ‘which mutual fund?’ to ‘what do you want your money to do for you?’, essentially solving for mis-selling,” Shah said.
The company refused to disclose their revenue. According to data from Tracxn, The Financialist clocked a revenue of Rs 1.07 crore in FY24 with a net profit of Rs 19.9 lakh. The Financialist is backed by Rainmatter Foundation. This year, the company is planning to grow its NRI base and launch new planning tools.
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( Originally published on Jul 22, 2025 )
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