When Jim King sits down with clients for the first time, he hands them the usual forms and risk-assessment questionnaires and a Myers-Briggs personality test, the same one used by top corporations to size up potential hires. I've found it useful...
Jim Gorman, head of Merrill Lynch's global private client group, says his unit is working up an appetite for acquisition. Speaking at a financial services conference sponsored by Smith Barney, Gorman said the firm is excited about its recent...
Much has been written in this space about how to attract, service and retain affluent clients, but there has been precious little about what actions to avoid. Drawing from my firm's research, here are 10 transgressions virtually guaranteed to...
The past year's earnings troubles belie the brokerage industry's sunny prospects for 2005, according to the SIA's Frank Fernandez. SIA figures for 2004 show dreary pretax profits of $19.5 billion, a 19.1 percent drop in broker/dealer earnings from...
Paper stock certificates are colorful and can give investors a sense of ownership in a company. But avoiding paper certificates a bastion of 19th century technology is a serious issue to the industry, because paper stock certificates have a...
Once upon a time some 20 years ago securities and insurance firms were dens of incest, with product manufacturing married closely to sales. Securities firms developed proprietary research ideas, launched new issues of stocks (including IPOs) and...
If you're pushing hot stocks, your days are numbered. Registered Representative editor's letter, March 1995. Soon afterward, the market entered a five-year bull run, driven largely by hot tech stocks.
The number of women with at least $500,000 in assets grew 17 percent from 1996 to 2000, according to the Chicago-based Spectrem Group. As a group, women's wealth has grown at a faster clip than that of affluent households' 14 percent.
M&A activity is on the rise this year, which means the crews in the backroom will be busy processing tender offers and channeling your responses. Handling corporate actions takeovers, rights issues, mergers, stock splits, redemptions is a big...
Suspended from the ceiling in Chuck Schwab's corner office high above the financial district of San Francisco is a mobile whose delicate parts sway in response to the slightest breeze or environmental change. Beneath this symbol Schwab says he...
