Billionaires may have much more to fear from a Bernie Sanders presidency than they do from an Elizabeth Warren administration, according to two economists advising both candidates. That’s one of the conclusions of a new interactive website developed by University of California, Berkeley professors Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman. If Mr. Sanders had his way, […]

A registered investment adviser in Texas has had his license revoked due to conflicts stemming from the sale of $5 million worth of Future Income Payment notes and promissory notes issued by third-party real estate developers. The adviser failed to disclose excessive commissions, misuse of client funds and conflicts of interest, according to the Texas […]

Custodians are introducing new technology to make it easier for financial advisers to use model investment portfolios with clients. BNY Mellon Pershing announced on Monday a new digital portal for managing and delivering model portfolios, while Fidelity Clearing and Custody Solutions is bringing customizable models to Fidelity AMP, its adviser-facing digital advice platform. [More: Enhancing […]

Legislation that would require the Securities and Exchange Commission to conduct investor testing of disclosures will come up for a vote later this week on the House floor, where it is likely to advance with mostly Democratic backing. The bill, the SEC Disclosure Effectiveness Testing Act (H.R. 1815), was approved in March by the House […]

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc. on Thursday barred a former Wells Fargo Advisors broker who did not cooperate with a Finra investigation. Earlier this year, the broker, Stephen Klinger, had been fired by Wells Fargo after it was revealed that he had traded options in his own account for a client and wound up […]

Picture this — you’re on a boat. The boat is sinking and you’re trying to plug the leaks, but new holes keep popping up. At this point, you don’t know whether you’ll sink or float. This situation may sound all too familiar to advisers. When your firm grows and you have clients with various needs, […]

Eric Dexter, who managed $250 million at Wells Fargo Advisors, has joined the Alex. Brown division of Raymond James. [More:​ See more adviser moves in InvestmentNews’ Advisers on the Move database.] Mr. Dexter will work from a branch office he opened for the firm in Portland, Maine. [Recommended video:​ Advisers should discuss ESG with wealthy […]

Joseph Mazzucco, who managed $100 million at JPMorgan Chase in Rye Brook, N.Y., has formed his own firm, Stonebrook Wealth Management. [More:​ See more adviser moves in InvestmentNews’ Advisers on the Move database.] The new firm, which will use the broker-dealer and corporate registered investment adviser platforms of LPL Financial, is based in Purchase, N.Y., […]

Its business model is out of fashion. Its fund family has suffered six straight years of outflows. Its stock has the lowest Wall Street ratings of any major money manager. [More:​ Franklin plans to cut up to 5% of workforce] No wonder Franklin Resources Inc.’s shares are down 48% in the last five years, and […]

Did you know you can stay up-to-date with all of our posts via our daily e-mail newsletter? Sign up today! Quote of the day “In short, EBITDA is pretty much just a made up number at this point, whatever management wants it to be.” – Christopher Schelling Chart of the day Why has film and […]

Mondays are all about financial adviser-related links here at Abnormal Returns. You can check out last week’s links including a look at why wirehouse customers still are light on index funds. Podcasts The biz Custody 403(b) plans Advisers

[embedded content] My friend Dave Nadig, who runs ETF.com, had some really interesting takes on the recent wave of commission-free trading announcements from Schwab, TD and Fidelity – and what it all might mean for both the brokers and their customers. Barry and Dave talked about this live on The Compound. Make sure you’re subscribed […]

The State of Michigan Retirement Fund’s pension account, worth more than $70 billion, ended its relationship with the investment firm of Ken Fisher in the latest backlash to offensive remarks the billionaire made last week at a conference. Mr. Fisher has apologized for sexist and off-color remarks he made at the Tiburon CEO summit in […]

Elsewhere in this blog we’ve discussed inherited IRAs and how to handle them – but we have not covered all of the options for a Spousal Inherited IRA separately. There are some differences, specifically more options available, so this is an important topic. It should be noted that the majority of this article applies to […]

Executive Summary It was Benjamin Franklin who once famously quipped “An investment in knowledge pays the best interest”. The caveat, however, is that like any investment, it’s still important to do your due diligence in researching whether any particular allocation of dollars will be a good investment. And with the proliferation of financial advisor conferences […]

As soon as Houston Rockets General Manager’s, Daryl Morey, tweeted “Fight for Freedom. Stand with Hong Kong,” the lucrative relationship between the NBA and China began to disintegrate. Given the China market is worth roughly $4 billion to the NBA, it was fascinating to see some owners, coaches, players, and the commission either say nothing, […]

Did you know you can stay up-to-date with all of our posts via our daily e-mail newsletter? Sign up today! Quote of the day “Change is most likely to take root when we deeply value aspects of ourselves and work on those to become the best possible versions of who we already are.” – Brett […]

Photo Credit: Simon Cunningham || Not paying a dividend does not create an enforceable claim, as happens when an interest payment is not made. Don’t get me wrong, I love dividends. I even have a money management strategy based off of them. But I know that dividends are more fickle than most of their fans […]

Did you know you can stay up-to-date with all of our posts via our daily e-mail newsletter? Sign up today! Quote of the day “The problem with limitless choice is that choice is daunting.” – Derek Kompare Chart of the day The top countries by tourist spending. (Visual Capitalist) Autos Energy Consumer Environment Fall foliage […]

Saturdays are all about longform links on Abnormal Returns. You can check out last week’s linkfest including a look at the rising popularity of Ireland’s Kerrygold butter. Amazon Places Health Sports Longreads

Over the last three years, Robert W. Cook has led the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc. in an extensive self-examination to create a better brokerage industry regulator. The former securities lawyer and head of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Division of Trading and Markets launched the Finra 360 initiative within months of becoming Finra’s president […]

Not so long ago, analyzing investments through the lens of environmental, social and governance criteria was considered a fringe practice that appealed to a very small segment of the investing public. [More: Why aren’t advisers warming up to ESG?] Times have changed. ESG principles are now important to an ever-broader range of investors, and interest […]

Photo credit: https://boardgamegeek.com || I probably played Jate 100+ times with my friends as a kid. Even at the time, I knew the market did not behave the way it did in Jate, or any other stock market game that I played. All of the common board games that I have run into on the […]

Senior citizens with high prescription drug costs are facing hundreds of dollars in additional expenses next year, according to a new analysis of Medicare’s drug program by a nonprofit research group. Medicare’s drug benefit, known as Part D, is complicated. Patients in the program have a deductible where they must pay 100% of the cost: […]

Fisher Investments is launching a diversity and inclusion task force in the wake of crude comments made earlier this week at an industry conference by company founder Ken Fisher, according to internal memos obtained by InvestmentNews. The documents, which were delivered to the more than 4,000 employees of the $110 billion RIA, included an apology […]

A broker fired by LPL Financial in August is facing an injunction and asset freeze from New Hampshire’s bureau of securities regulation, which alleges the broker, Dain F. Stokes, solicited two clients to invest more than half a million dollars in a fake African charity project in which he claimed Taylor Swift was personally involved. […]

Executive Summary Enjoy the current installment of “weekend reading for financial planners” – this week’s edition kicks off with the news that Fidelity has not only decided after all to match competing custodians with zero-commission trades on US stocks and ETFs, but is further accentuating how it provides better default money market options and eschews […]

Millennium Trust Co. has a new suite of affordable benefits and retirement tools that small business owners can offer in lieu of a traditional 401(k). Employers can use Workplace Savings Solutions to choose from a variety of types of individual retirement accounts that can be opened with a one-time start-up fee of $250 and that […]

Thank you, Ken Fisher, for shining a light on critically important issues. Mr. Fisher, founder and chairman of Fisher Investments, has been called out loudly for offensive comments he made at the Tiburon CEO Summit this week in San Francisco. Alex Chalekian, CEO of Lake Avenue Financial, ignited the firestorm with a two-minute video on […]

Jeffrey Hendel, whose Hendel Wealth Management Group manages $245 million, has switched the affiliation of his business to Raymond James from Ameriprise Financial. [More:​ See more adviser moves in InvestmentNews‘ Advisers on the Move database.] Mr. Hendel is joined in the move by advisers Morgan Weil, Rinaldo Crassa and Peter Halliwell, as well as the […]

Investors haven’t been this bearish since the collapse of Lehman Brothers. At least that’s what their positioning is signaling, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch strategists. Over the past six months, money-market funds attracted $322 billion of inflows, the largest flight to safe assets since the second half of 2008. In similar fashion to […]

Shifting demographics, changing attitudes toward advice, and growing regulatory and compliance requirements are placing greater demands on financial advisers to generate more efficiencies and economies of scale to meet their goals. Despite these efforts, research from State Street Global Advisors suggests that advisers’ business practices are not always aligned with their goals. While advisers’ top […]

Did you know you can stay up-to-date with all of our posts via our daily e-mail newsletter? Sign up today! Quote of the day “WeWork’s IPO stumble is good news for equity owners. Only an overcooked stock market would have accepted that offering under those terms.” – John Rekenthaler Chart of the day Apple ($AAPL) […]

Fridays are all about podcast links here at Abnormal Returns. You can check out last week’s links including a look at the best USB microphone on the market. The biz Finance Non-finance

After publishing, The Hardest Mortgage Refinance Ever, a reader asked me whether I’ve ever considered recasting a mortgage instead. My quick answer was no, despite having refinanced multiple mortgages on multiple properties since 2005. I’m all about getting the lowest mortgage rate possible. Recasting a mortgage can be a good idea if you come into […]

This report features world capital market performance and a timeline of events for the past quarter. It begins with a global overview, then features the returns of stock and bond asset classes in the US and international markets. The report also illustrates the impact of globally diversified portfolios and features a quarterly topic. Have any […]

As you are probably aware, each year your Social Security benefits can be increased by a factor that helps to keep up with the rate of inflation – so that your benefit’s purchasing power doesn’t decrease over time.  These are called Cost Of Living Adjustments, COLAs for short.  The increase for 2019 was 2.8% – […]

Ethan Harris is the global economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Following the course of the trade war with China and all of the associated developments has become something of a necessity for market participants, even if they’ve concluded (as I have) that no one has an edge on what will happen next (or […]

The Grand Prize Winner in the WCI Scholarship contest goes to Allison Neeson, an MS1 at Tufts University School of Medicine. First place in the 2019 WCI Scholarship contest is good for $42,660 cash, her choice of a WCI Online Course, and a copy of The White Coat Investor’s Financial Boot Camp for each member […]