Investment Advisor February 2010
Cover Story
Cover Story: Invest Globally, Advise Locally
Advisors operate in a worldwide sphere when it comes to planning for clients, and over the past year, investment globalization has been the place to...
Cover Story
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Investment Opportunities May Well Abound in 2010
The New Year greets no shortage of opinion about the markets. While a number of pundits are saying that stocks must eventually pull back from...
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A Self-Imposed Barrier for Advisors Serving South Asian Clients
There are just two issues that advisors who are interested in serving clients from the South Asian diaspora need to understand: Family and community. They...
Features
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Serving the Underserved (Millionaire)
There was a time not too long ago when the big Wall Street brands, such as Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, SmithBarney, and many other names...
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Raising Your Game
What's the common characteristic that most successful advisors share? It's not their compensation model, or choice of custodian or broker/dealer, or even an entrepreneurial streak....
Beginnings
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Asset Allocation
EVERY JANUARY WE survey the members of our Asset Allocation panel and ask them to predict some of what advisors and their clients can expect...
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Venture Populist: Venture Hits and Exit Wounds
I have noticed that venture capitalists tend to talk more about their home runs than their strikeouts. Angel investors, on the other hand, prefer to...
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The ETF Advisor: S&P 500 ETFs
[Editor's Note: This is a longer version of the article which appeared in the print edition of Investment Advisor, Februrary 2010 and includes S&P rankings...
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Schwab Keeps Up the Price Pressure
Schwab is cutting costs, again. Charles Schwab Corp. announced January 7 that it will begin charging a flat $8.95 per online trade of equities or...
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The Effect of Dodd's Retirement
Opinions vary as to what Senator Christopher Dodd's retirement, announced in January, will mean for financial services and healthcare reform. Knut Rostad, chairman of The...
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Washington Watch: Fiduciary Wrangling Resumes
The fiduciary battle is kicking into high gear. Advisor trade groups as well as state securities regulators and investors rang in the New Year by...
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GroupThink
? At the 2010 Investment Management Consultants Association (IMCA) New York Consultants Conference on January 10, IMCA introduced its new president, John Granzow, who began...
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Changes
? Chautauqua Capital Management, the Boulder, Colorado-based investment firm, has announced the appointment of John F. Lynch, formerly of Franklin Templeton Investments, as the firm's...
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Upgrades
TD Ameritrade Institutional says advisors have embraced the firm's Roadmap Program, an online set of tools created by Minneapolis-based ActiFi that enable RIA firms to...
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Editor's Note: Migrant Musings in a New Age
Anniversaries, like this year in which Investment Advisor marks its 30th birthday, tend to make me introspective and retrospective. Throughout the year we will report...
Columns
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The Affluentialist: Trends in Client Communication
Nothing will completely replace the benefits of face-to-face client meetings, but the pressure for greater efficiency and convenience is propelling advisors to try new means...
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The Green Advisor: Adding ESG to Asset Allocation
For advisors who have clients with an expressed desire to have their investments mirror their personal values, whether those values are social, religious, or environmental,...
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Formulas for Success: Howl at the Moon
I've long been interested in how businesses outside of financial services make decisions and execute strategies. Keeping an outside perspective has helped me to think...
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Clark at Large: Declaration of Independence
Last Fall, my old friend Bob Veres did a rather common thing, which yielded some uncommonly interesting results. Veres asked his newsletter readers to identify...
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The Psychology of Advice: Resolution Trust
So, how did you do with your New Year's resolutions? Uh-huh. Me, too. This is the month of Valentine's Day, our annual celebration of love,...
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The Fast Track: Bonus Babies
If you're like most independent advisors, you probably discontinued your employee bonus program at the end of 2008, when you realized you were committed to...
Conclusions
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Retirement Planning: Top Trends in Retirement
Here's what's on the retirement planning horizon for 2010: a focus on longevity risk and new retirement savings vehicles--namely the auto IRA and DB(k)--for workers....
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Retirement News
Kathryn Capage, Strategic Planning Director for the Retirement & Tax Advantages Products Division for AIM Investments, recently detailed in a Center for Due Diligence (CFDD)...
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Broker/Dealer Briefing: New Leader for FSI
We caught up with Mari Buechner, CCO and CEO of Coordinated Capital Securities, Inc., of Madison, Wisconsin, after her election as the new chair of...
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Securities Lawsuits Down
The number of federal securities class action law suits filed in 2009 dropped sharply according to the recently released report, Securities Class Action Filings--2009: A...
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Broker/Dealer News
The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board (MSRB) has launched a Web site called Electronic Municipal Market Access (EMMA) www.emma.msrb.org, that provides free access to a powerful...
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Insurance Update: Along for the Rider
If your clients are looking for limited disability coverage without taking on a whole new policy, they could look at life insurance. Life insurance policies these...
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Expert's Corner: Small, Yes, But Compliant
Publicly embarrassed by a series of undetected frauds by investment firms, the Securities and Exchange Commission has sharpened its investigative and regulatory inspections. RIA firms...
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Soapbox: Here's What We Were Thinking
The Financial Planning Coalition is glad to see Bob Clark's vociferous advocacy of a fiduciary standard of care for individuals who dispense financial planning advice...
Sidebar Stories
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Starting Early
Ask a group of 10-year-olds what they want to do when they grow up and you're likely to get answers like, "Play in the NBA,"...
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Our Panel of Experts' Projections for 2010
Every January, just after the turn of the New Year, Investment Advisor's editors pick the brains of our Asset Allocation panelists, asking for their projections...
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About the Advisor
Bennett Marks Founder/President/CIO Marks Group Wealth Management 4350 Baker Road, Suite 245 Minnetonka, MN 55343 Phone: 952-582-6100 E-mail: ben.marks@marksgroup.com Web site: http://marksgroup.com/ Year firm founded: 2008 Number of advisors in firm: 4 (plus client...
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What the Rankings Mean
The ETF rankings provided in this article (Overweight, Marketweight, Underweight) are based on a proprietary S&P methodology that incorporates an assessment of the ETF's underlying...
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So You Want to Have a Profession?
Bob Clark not-so-humbly presents the following five standards--almost an oath!--that will clearly and unambiguously define a new profession of Independent Financial Advisors. Standard One: I have...
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Forgive Us Our Imperfections
For a deeper understanding of how to move past lapses in progress toward a better self, I recommend these excellent books. On forgiveness: Radical Acceptance: Embracing...
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A Self-Defeating Mentality
When it comes to building a rational bonus plan for employees, the irrationality of performance-based plans became clear during the 2008-2009 markets and economic crisis....
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Beware Green Investment Scams
Green energy offers opportunities for new jobs and investments. Unfortunately, the green energy field has also attracted individuals with less than honorable intentions. On January 6,...
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Older and Online
From November 2004 until November 2009, the number of people over 65 years old who actively used the Internet jumped by 55%, according to a...
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Resource Library
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Are you prepared to offer innovative alternative investment solutions to your clients and explain the...
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Complimentary White Paper: "Strategies on Advising Couples"
Grow your practice by rethinking how you view, interact and approach investment decisions when working...
Breaking up is hard to do
Love being a financial advisor? Not getting what you need from your current firm? Hear...
The Best of Both Worlds with Century Securities
Our independent affiliates enjoy the freedom to make important choices and the professional resources of...
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This advice is based on industry research and the practical observations of other advisors who...
Complimentary Informational Brochure on Ameritas Life and Annuities
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Working Smarter: Engaging Prospects And Clients Through Social Media
For financial advisors, social media represents a powerful addition to traditional marketing and networking activities....
Complimentary Copy of "Winning Advantage: The Financial Advisor Playbook for...
Find out the four crucial steps you need to follow to choose the right technology...
Complimentary White Paper: "Alternative Investments in the Mainstream "
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