It's hunting season on financial planning tech vendors, who at current valuations, are all too happy to get bagged. First, eMoney Advisor, now Finance Logix. While future buyers may not be willing to pay a premium, it won’t be long till we are talking trifecta. What's behind the interest in these financial planning vendors? Well, as a class, they enjoy an important point of distinction from other vendors in the wealth management ecosystem, in that the tools they offer enable real proximity to the end customer (e.g. think client portals and the ability to tweak data for visualization). Closeness to the consumer helps a firm to exercise market power. In this context, the more than $30 million Envestnet paid for Finance Logix is almost immaterial. Envestnet is jockeying for position in the bigger wealth management ecosystem, and they really wanted this kind of client touch point. This deal was about strategic considerations, not price.