What's wrong with investing in racehorses? The slow ones eat as much as the fast ones, and even the fast ones only rarely earn their keep. And then there are the crooked characters who lurk around the business...More
Worried that interest rates could rise for years to come, some investors have been dumping their bonds. But the extreme bears are probably overreacting...More
Americans are getting fatter and older by the minute. While that’s not happy news for us individually, it certainly represents an opportunity for healthcare real estate investment trusts...More
Registered Rep.: So you are an Ayn Rand fan, and specifically of her heroic character John Galt. Why? David Loeper: Nearly 20 years ago I read Atlas Shrugged....More
Whoever said it was painful to talk to your kids about sex? According to a new survey from ING Direct USA, parents are more prepared to talk to their kids about the birds and the bees than about money and finances...More
The Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards is coming to a cable TV channel, magazine, and website near you. The board last month launched the first wave in a four-year marketing campaign to promote the CFP brand to the public, at a cost of nearly $40 million...More
After switching broker dealers, a long-time advisor is looking to attract a handful of reps to his new branch and to publicize his association with his current b/d.
For advice, as usual, we asked our panel of experts for their opinions...More
Today, it is very difficult for parents to know how much financial aid they might get from any particular college. That will change in October, when colleges will be required by federal law to place cost calculators on their websites...More
Many of your Boomer clients have elderly parents who are facing a seemingly unsolvable problem: how to produce enough income to cover increasing living costs without jeopardizing investment principal. But for families in the right situation, it’s possible to dramatically improve the cash flowing to the older parent, without risking the value of (or access to) her “rainy day” fund. Here’s how reverse mortgages can serve as an unorthodox solution to a common dilemma....More
The increasing importance that the advisor-assistant relationship plays in the loyalty of today's affluent client prompted the Oechsli Institute to conduct a study on advisors and assistants. Among numerous findings, we were able to uncover seven key attributes advisors want to see in their assistants...More