Dynamics 365 for Investment Management: F&O for Asset Managers and Investment Firms

D365 F&O is the wrong answer for the OMS (Charles River, Aladdin, Eze), the fund accounting system, the portfolio analytics platform, or the trading systems. Those are dedicated investment management platforms. F&O is the right answer for the financial backbone — general ledger for the management company and the GP entities, AP for the operating expenses, multi-entity consolidation across management company plus funds plus GPs plus foundation, fee billing reconciliation against the AUM data the fund accountant maintains, expense allocation across funds, and the regulatory reporting financial data inputs (Form ADV, Form PF). With the financial controls SEC examination expects.

Investment F&O done right configures the GL with the dimensional structure that supports management company accounting separate from fund accounting, multi-entity consolidation for the typical asset manager structure, fee billing reconciliation against AUM data, expense allocation methodology, and the regulatory reporting data feeds. With the audit trail SEC examination requires. Done with this discipline, F&O delivers in 12-18 months. Done as generic ERP, it produces a system that doesn't support fee billing reconciliation or regulatory reporting.