You may like your financial advisor, but is he really looking out for you? All advisors are not created equal, and you have a right to know what makes them different! You also have a right to ask yours if he compares!
(1) Do you use a holistic approach to financial planning by determining my values and goals?
(2) Do you work on a fee-only basis, a commission basis, or both, and why?
(3) Do you have company-established insurance requirements, or do you recommend insurance only when it is needed by your clients?
(4) Do you attempt to ‘beat’ the market through timing and selection, or do you believe that attempts to do so are not worth the additional level of fees and risk? Are you aware that a vast majority of my returns will be based on asset allocation, rather than timing and selection?
(5) Are you a Registered Investment Advisor, and therefore a fiduciary? In other words, must you legally and ethically put my interests above your own?
(6) Do you meet with your clients at least three times a year to refine their portfolio and find out how events in their lives may have changed their financial goals?
(7) Do you return phone calls the same day you receive them, and are you available to answer questions as they arise?
(8) When you wake up each morning, do you ask yourself how you can best be of help to your clients that day?
Adjust these questions as you see fit, and depending upon what your own objectives and needs are from an advisor. The best advice is to never be afraid to ask!
© 2004 Matthew S. Clement, All rights reserved
Matthew S. Clement is a financial planner and investment advisor representative with Financial Network Investment Corporation, member SIPC. He provides holistic wealth management and retirement planning to individuals and businesses. He can be reached in New York at (845) 942-8578, or by email: ClementM@FinancialNetwork.com.
Tags: advisor, allocation, asset, bonds, financial, finding, funds, investment, money, mutual, planner, stocksadvisor, allocation, asset, bonds, financial, finding, funds, investment, money, mutual, planner, stocksShare This
bonds @ 06 Apr 2008 05:07 am by admin
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Sometimes you spend sleepless nights worrying about which stocks to buy and which to sell, which funds to own and which to dump and whether to get into bonds.
All of these are legitimate concerns, but the greatest determinant of your success as an investor will not be your sagacity in selecting specific stocks, bonds or funds for your portfolio. No, it will be your asset allocation. That is, the way you slice up your portfolio into broad categories of, say, large-cap growth stocks and value stocks and triple A bonds and so on.
There are many opportunities available to today’s investor. Taking advantage of these opportunities by strategically distributing your money in a number of different instruments can protect your portfolio and improve your chances of achieving a desired return.
It is important for investors to understand that diversification in building a balanced portfolio helps reduce risk and improve returns.
Asset allocation is yet another way to diversify. It takes advantage of the fact that when it comes to risk and reward, financial categories like stocks, bonds and money-market (cash equivalent) accounts all behave quite differently!
Stocks, for instance, offer the highest returns among those three “asset classes,” but they also carry the highest risk of losses.
Bonds aren’t so lucrative, but they offer a lot more stability than stocks.
Money-market returns are puny, but you’ll never lose your initial investment.
An asset-allocation strategy looks at your particular goals and circumstances and determines what asset mix gives you the optimal blend of risk and reward.
Asset allocation is a process that you re-visit again and again as you continue to build your portfolio throughout your life. Learn to identify the events that can indicate a period of re-evaluation of your asset allocation!
Chances are that, over time, the value of your investments in stocks will grow more quickly than that of your investments in bonds and cash equivalents. Eventually you will likely have a larger percentage of your money invested in stocks than your original strategy recommended.
When this situation occurs, your portfolio could be exposed to more risk. To help ensure that your assets are invested appropriately, periodically rebalance your investments!
Ioannis Evangelos (Akis) Haramis
haramis@greekshares.com
http://www.greekshares.com
Ioannis Evangelos (Akis) Haramis was born in Athens, Greece in 1951. He studied in Greece, in USA and in Belgium and has been active in the stock markets since 1972. Since 2002 he is New Business Development Managing Director at an Investment Bank and the publisher of http://www.GreekShares.com
Tags: allocation, asset, finance, investing, investment, investor, Stock, stock marketallocation, asset, finance, investing, investment, investor, Stock, stock marketShare This
finance @ 21 Mar 2008 11:20 am by admin
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