By Cora Pettipas, CFP, Canada

There have been many times I have questioned people’s sanity in their relationship with money. My most vivid memory of this was when I waddled into a Starbucks (I was eight months pregnant). On the way to the counter, I passed a young opulent-looking couple sipping lattes and saying to their toddler son, “you are never going to college, no you’re not, no you’re not!” This made me cringe and it took everything in me not to interrupt their family moment with an explanation on the universal child care benefit and how that can be pared with an RESP so as to save but not to infringe cash flow (maybe just some of their

Continue reading Behavioral Finance: Progress Makes Perfect

By Martin Iglesias, CFP

Philipp E. Ross published in August 2006 a study in Scientific American named “The Expert Mind” which pointed out that to achieve a state of full expertise in a particular subject one needs 10 years of experience.

Before that, in 1993 the psychologist Anders Ericsson, wrote an article proposing the rule of 10,000 hours, stating that the stage of excellence can only be achieved after practicing a subject for a such number of hours.

These articles do not address the issue of collective knowledge, ie, how the interaction with more experienced people in a particular subject can help reduce this period or if an organization or association behaves the same way.

Continue reading Financial Planning in Brazil and the 10 Years Rule

By Cora Pettipas, CFP

The Problem

Debt accumulation is a cancer to individual wealth and is currently the biggest threat to financial planners. Why? Because before you can do any proactive financial planning with a client, they need to have a positive cash flow. For clients, debt is easily available, easy to accumulate and normalized by our society. As one of my clients once said to me; “You are going to be in debt your whole life anyway; you might as well enjoy yourself.” I have also heard numerous justifications for overspending from other clients when doing their cash flow analysis. My favourite is “Well, you only live once; you might as well

Continue reading Debt: The Biggest Threat to Financial Planning and a Cancer to Cash Flow

By Michael Kitces, CFP

It has long been a criticism of financial planning that it is focused too far up the wealth scale. Financial planning firms in the US at best only start serving the “mass affluent” (typically defined as $100,000 to $1 million in investment assets), and the elite independent firms often have minimums of one or several million dollars. The only exception is typically the younger high income earner, who may not have sufficient assets yet, but earns a few hundred thousand dollars a year, is accumulating assets quickly, and may need significant income tax planning support in the meantime. Yet the statistics show that the average American doesn’t even have $100,000 in investment assets, and nearly

Continue reading Financial Planning For The Masses Works – As Long As You Can Really Reach The Masses!

By Taylor Liao, CFP

The financial planning profession faces a lot of challenges including a general lack of awareness from the public, competing designations that confuse the public, lack of regulation, and people claiming to be “financial planners” when they are not qualified.  

The biggest challenge in my opinion for CFP professionals is the uncertainty about the future of financial planning. Some people in the industry don’t want to face the challenge of becoming a financial planner. It is rare to find a CFP professional who is willing to take the risk, roll up their sleeves, and setup a financial planning firm.

I don’t think being a financial planner will ever be

Continue reading Practice Challenges Facing Financial Planners

Phil Billingham, CFP says yes:

As an argument for staying on commission, it’s right up there with ‘But my clients won’t pay fees’. It’s ‘If I move to fees, my older/smaller clients will not be able to afford me’. To translate this, the argument is that ‘I will have to stop looking after them because they will not be profitable enough’.

Can I suggest the following?

Continue reading Point, Counterpoint: Can fee-only financial planners serve smaller clients effectively?

Willie Yiu, AFP has worked in financial services for 12 years. Graduating with a degree in financial planning, he worked with advisers and clients in Australia, Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong to devise holistic solutions to the problems faced by globe-trotting expatriates. In addition, he also ensured professional and compliance standards have been met by advisers.

The combination of experience in financial planning and his dedication to uphold its standards resulted in the highlight of Will’s career so far when he was awarded 2011 Hong Kong’s Best Financial Planner of the Year at the prestigious IFPHK/SCMP Financial Planner Awards. The Awards are co-organised by the Hong Kong Institute of Financial Planners and the South China Morning Post.

Continue reading Willie Yiu, AFP

By Suresh Sadagopan, CFP

“Times, they are a’ changing”, goes a song from times gone by. For the financial services industry, the changes have started coming in, fast and thick, since 2008.

The entire financial community was viewed with suspicion, with bankers bearing the brunt, for obvious reasons. Investor protection became the mantra and regulators started acting, on what they thought was best for investors. The current set of regulations in various parts of the world are trying to check mis-selling, bring in a suitability criteria for products advised to investors, ensure that proper risk assessment  is done before suggesting products, etc. In some parts of the world, they are trying

Continue reading Regulatory Changes in India Affecting Financial Planners

By Dennis Lau, IFPHK CEO

The Institute of Financial Planners of Hong Kong (IFPHK) is proud to host the upcoming Financial Planning Standards Board (FPSB) meeting at The Langham Hong Kong from 22-26 April.  The IFPHK and FPSB have committed to putting together a conference week based on past success and the best Hong Kong has to offer to ensure we have a great and productive few days together. This year, much of the focus of discussion will be on growing the financial planning profession around the world.

IOSCO’s Stephen Po Speaking on Suitability

In addition to representatives from FPSB’s 24 member organizations, we are honored to have Professor KC Chan, Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury, attend

Continue reading FPSB Meeting in Hong Kong