The following letter, based on a real life situation with a friend and the friend's financial advisor, offers a peek at issues concerning boomer clients (all names are fictitious): Dear Roger: Thank you for spending so much time counseling our...
What does an advisor do when clients at his firm are routinely charged an undisclosed commission on top of fees and he suffers for not falling in line? Q: I work for a major wirehouse. Like most others in our industry, we offer fee-based accounts...
A must read for any self-respecting financial advisor? The Millionaire Maker by Loral Langemeier. She advocates active, direct investments in things like private businesses and real estate. She's against the park-and-pray method that most people...
Critics complain that hedge funds are too expensive for the returns they have lately been producing. Setting performance aside (which is as varied as the strategies pursued), on first blush, the ante does seem somewhat dear: Most hedge funds...
Brokers must take tests. It's a fact of Wall Street life. That some people will go too far in an effort to pass them is sadly a fact of industry life, too. Here are a few of the more egregious examples: That's an Old Photo of Me Dmitry Verkhovsky ...
A growing number of Americans are saving more money than they're likely to spend in their lifetimes. For advisors, it's a good time to talk to such clients about endowing a college scholarship, getting their name on a hospital wing, donating an...
Management of A.G. Edwards is trimming its compensation and raising the performance expectations it has on brokers. As the brokerage industry moves upmarket and seeks better return on equity and profit margins, the pressure for reps (and their...
Merrill Lynch, in an effort to bolster distribution of its poor-selling proprietary funds among third-party financial advisors, unveiled on Monday a new retail asset-management brand name: Princeton.