[Data design and data research platforms are becoming vitally important areas for InvestTech innovation. This is especially true in the hunt for measurable alpha where traditional investment data, tools, and systems - and how they are being used - are being questioned as to their true alpha-generating contributions. Advanced technology and data platform architecture are being applied to provide higher levels of market intelligence for better design, testing, and validation of investment strategies and model portfolios.

To explore this area of InvestTech innovation more fully, we reached out to Rocco Pellegrinelli, CEO of Trendrating, a leading provider of advanced analytics and investment research technology to over 300 institutional, asset, and wealth management firms globally. We asked him to share his thinking and experience on how he built his investment research and analytics firm into an alpha discovery technology and performance management platform.]

 

Hortz: What was your reasoning behind engineering your investment research data services into an alpha discovery technology and performance management platform?

Pellegrinelli: As a former investment manager and user of traditional investment data, tools, and systems, I realized that many analytical tools make sense, but I always questioned whether they also make money. I wanted to redefine how professional investors approach alpha generation and risk management to introduce a new way to look at market intelligence. Their key use should focus on answering the question: Where is the alpha?

This is the question that many professional investors have when they start analyzing the value of the data, research, tools, and terminals they use for their investment decisions. If alpha cannot be measured and proven, it probably is not there. Professional Investors deserve better market intelligence to discover the actual facts they need - unveiling which parameters, analytics, rules, and trends can produce real alpha.

This became our mission. Trendrating investment technology was designed to empower an advanced alpha discovery process through rigorous testing, delivering factual insights with measurable impact on performance and full transparency documentation. This provides the market intelligence most needed to support effective investment performance management.

Hortz: Why did you initially focus on developing your price trend monitoring technology and call for investment managers to have a heightened “respect for” monitoring price trends?

Pellegrinelli: Our core belief is simple: understanding and respecting price trends is not optional - it is essential. Market research needs to reflect not only fundamentals but also sentiment, momentum, and patterns that often precede headline events. It is also a key investment research objective to profit from the consistent, ongoing performance dispersion across stocks and sectors, separating the outperformers from the losers. The probability of success is higher when one combines the most productive fundamentals with the objective validation of price trends.

But assessing the true direction and quality of medium-term price trends requires a methodology more sophisticated than conventional approaches. Let me clarify that we do not have just a “momentum” measure. The traditional definition of Momentum asks how fast a stock has moved. Our model asks for something more useful: Is the trend real, and is it confirmed by the balance of buying versus selling pressure underneath it?

That is why it can flag a downtrend while the price still looks fine and confirm an uptrend without chasing a spike. It is a multi-factor, pattern-recognition read on the trend itself, not a speed gauge. Old-school methodologies tend to be either late at spotting trends or erratic during high volatility phases.

Reading and respecting actual trends with well-proven metrics is essential as the performance of a portfolio is simply the combination of the trends across the holdings. Dismissing the importance of a solid trend evaluation is often the main reason behind underperformance.

Our price trend methodology also provides heightened support for managers in their buying and selling decisions and allows them to measure and monitor their full investment portfolios for areas of growing weakness and support.

Hortz: What is the other key research area you focused on to strengthen alpha discovery support for asset managers?

Pellegrinelli: Trendrating built its reputation by proving which investment trend signals generate strong returns. We have now also applied that same testing technology to fundamental parameters.

The goal is to discover the true alpha value of different fundamental parameters and how to combine them to design a superior selection strategy. Advanced data discovery technology can reveal which fundamental parameters capture more alpha and uncover how different sectors reward different parameters. They can be different across markets and sectors.

Unveiling the most productive fundamental parameters for every specific investment universe makes a big difference. This provides fact-based knowledge and market insights not available in many existing systems and platforms.

The objective is simple: identify what actually works, quantify the difference, and turn factual evidence into actionable investment intelligence.

Hortz: How do you see managers combining your two areas of advanced trend and fundamental research?

Pellegrinelli: Fundamentals describe the business. The trend describes what buyers and sellers are actually doing about it. One without the other is half an answer, and half an answer is not enough to deliver superior performance.

This is exactly what timely, AI-driven advanced analytics are designed to do: identify risk before the market fully prices it in. When the warning or opportunity comes early, investors have the opportunity to act, not react after the fact.
 

Hortz: Can you explain how you integrated AI functionality into your alpha discovery technology to support managers in their research process?

Pellegrinelli: Besides strengthening both our fundamental and trend research capabilities and their accuracy, we designed AI in our platform to be a proactive tool for managers in their investment research activities.

We designed our AI optimizer to help managers refine their investment strategies and maximize performance. It is always possible to improve any metric with the AI optimizer, which analyzes 50,000 strategies and finds the one that satisfies the research request. The list of KPIs that can be improved is rich, covering performance, drawdowns, volatility, turnover, and more. The list of suggested changes is transparent. The functionality rationale offers a new paradigm for knowledge and compliance.

 We also recently designed and launched an AI agent to personally assist an investment manager on how to best navigate the vast market data and research capabilities on our platform. Our new AI Assistant is a fully conversational tool crafted to offer guidance on best practices in the selection process and explain the best use of the wealth of information and analytics, providing tips on how to maximize returns, reduce portfolio risks, and make platform navigation faster, easier, and more intuitive.

Our AI Assistant understands plain language, unlike traditional Help features, allowing users to ask questions naturally and receive clear, actionable guidance. Whether a manager is looking to validate investment ideas, spot new risks, or build and validate active strategies and bespoke model portfolios, our AI assistant delivers step-by-step instructions tailored to their needs. What sets this AI assistant apart is its ability to continuously learn and improve, adapting to your workflows, and becoming an increasingly valuable investment tool resource over time.

Hortz: You mentioned making the alpha discovery process and use of your platform easier and faster to navigate. Can you explain how you accomplished that?

Pellegrinelli: One of Trendrating’s key differentiators is that our modern research platform and investment technology does not just deliver data. It is a comprehensive, “All-in-One”, alpha discovery system and performance management platform to design, test, validate, enhance, document, and execute investment strategies. We provide innovative advanced analytics and AI technology that can improve investment performance and more effectively control risks. And we affirm that the alpha contribution is fully measurable and trackable in our system - an important competitive advantage.

Our key differentiator and benefit for investment managers is that we also strategically designed our platform and the inherent research process for maximum usability and speed - to enable managers to quickly and efficiently, with a few clicks, get better information, arrive at the insights they need, and save time on irrelevant noise and data.

Any investment process can be improved. The only question is whether you are deciding with heightened market trend intelligence or without it. Validate it yourself here with a free trial → https://lnkd.in/gnd4SiXV

 

The Institute for Innovation Development is an educational and business development catalyst for growth-oriented financial advisors and financial services firms determined to lead their businesses in an operating environment of accelerating business and cultural change. We operate as a business innovation platform and educational resource with FinTech and Financial Services firm members to openly share their unique perspectives and activities.

This interview is for informational purposes only. The goal is to build awareness and stimulate open thought leadership discussions on new or evolving industry approaches and thinking to facilitate next-generation growth, differentiation, and unique client/community engagement strategies. The Institute was launched with the support and foresight of our founding sponsors — Ultimus Fund Solutions, FLX Networks, ETF Global, The Wealth Mosaic, SME Forum, Advisorpedia, Pershing, Fidelity, and Charter Financial Publishing (publisher of Financial Advisor and Private Wealth magazines).

Institute for Innovation Development - @innovationIID www.innovationdevelopment.org - IID©2026