AllianceBernstein

AllianceBernstein continues to earn an Average rating for Parent as it looks to stand out by focusing on more personalized investment options.

The firm is investing heavily in technology, particularly tools that tailor portfolios to investors’ taxes to maximize aftertax returns. This push is most visible in separately managed accounts that focus on municipal bonds and direct indexing. The investment helps the portfolios perform more efficiently, from funding separate accounts faster for municipal bonds to enhancements in tax-loss harvesting for both stocks and bonds. Since 2020, retail SMAs doubled to almost 12% of the firm’s US assets under management as of the end of 2025, highlighting the increased importance of these tax-managed offerings to the firm. While increased personalization could lead to better client outcomes, it’s not clear that it improves the firm’s broader investment processes.

AB is also using artificial intelligence tools across its investment teams to speed up research and improve workflows. The firm says analysts can now complete some tasks in hours instead of days, potentially freeing more time for deeper analysis. So far, though, like at competitors that also use AI, the benefits appear mostly tied to efficiency, and it will be difficult to assess the impact on investment decisions. There has also been a greater adoption of quantitative tools within the emerging-market equity group as a way to improve processes that had struggled to deliver competitive returns. Results have generally been better since Sammy Suzuki was named head of emerging-market equities in July 2022, but it’s still a short time period.

The pending merger between its majority owner Equitable and Corebridge (expected to close by the end of 2026) could bring in an additional $100 billion in insurance and separate-account mandates. AB CEO Seth Bernstein will oversee the larger asset management business, so integration risks and potential redundancies bear watching.

Note: This share class' Parent Pillar rating is analyst-driven, as its Branding Name, AllianceBernstein (Branding Name ID: BN000007W3), is covered by Morningstar Manager Research.