On 20th March, at Barron’s Top Independent Advisor summit, Ric Edelman organized a Pre-Event on blockchain and cryptocurrency, the event was attended by almost 155 top financial advisors and influencers of United States in the virtual asset space. Ahead of the Pre-event, 96 percent of the participants had developed a negative viewpoint on crypto assets. After the event, 89 percent of the participators had a positive view for crypto assets. Federick Mark “Ric” Edelman is the chairman and the co-founder of Edelman Financial Services.

The event took place in Salt Lake City and financially funded by big firms such as Bitwise Investments, Grayscale Investments, Van Eck, Fidelity Digital Assets and Pantera Capital. The participants underwent half-day training which lasted for 5 hours. The educational course was related to blockchain and cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin.

The educational course was aided by Kingdom Trust, Blockforce Capital, Orion Advisor Services, Pantera Capital, State Street Global Advisors and others.

Reasons why the group had a negative viewpoint on crypto assets

80 percent of the financial advisors said that they knew very little or nothing about crypto assets and blockchain.

84 percent of advisors did not have any kind of cryptocurrency.

92 percent of advisors mentioned that they were unable to explain the concept of cryptocurrency to their clients.

44 percent of them believed that Bitcoin is just speculation and not an investment.

Before the event, 96 percent of the participants who finished the survey mentioned that they don’t suggest virtual currencies to clients and 79 percent of them mentioned that they have no desire of doing so in the days to come. By the end of the event, opinions of advisors on crypto assets had significantly changed. 89 percent of advisors after completing the post-event survey stated that they now have a very positive view of blockchain and cryptocurrency.

However, after the event, the post-program survey reported that-

89 percent of advisors had a positive view of crypto assets.

91 percent of them might stop discouraging their clients from purchasing crypto or buy it for themselves.

89 percent of them believed that bitcoin is no more speculation.

82 percent of them mentioned that they are hopeful of purchasing crypto and 71 percent of them raised their prediction over the future price of bitcoin.

Ric Edelman has recently named as the number 1 Independent Financial Advisor for the third time by Barron’s. He mentioned about the advisors’ change of mind that the outstanding change in the attitude of the top financial advisors indicated that there is a need for teaching advisors about the importance of these emerging technologies. Advisors who are not able to answer the queries of their clients related to bitcoin are mostly to lose their credibility with clients, and this may make the advisors lose clients.

The press release mentioned the notable thing is that when the advisors entered the room most of them were ‘bears.’ However, after the event, they did not feel bullish about Bitcoin and other digital assets.