Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the firm,
Not a loss was un-harvested, not even long-term.
Reports were uploaded to portals with care,
Right next to newsletters with good news to share.
The clients were pleased with their tax assessments,
With visions of goals and model investments.
My partner and I, after giving a greeting,
Had just settled in to a new client meeting.
When out in the hall there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from my chair to see what was the matter.
Away to my netbook I flew like a flash,
Double-clicked on Google Chrome, fearing a crash.
Quite a few searches are being made right now for the results from the November 2009 CFP® Certification Examination.
Remember that CFP Board posts regular status updates to its website to inform examinees of the scoring process. Today, CFP Board released the following update:
In addition, CFP Board recorded their webinar on July 30, 2009 discussing the post CFP® Exam process and what examinees can expect while waiting for results. I’m including the YouTube video below for your convenience.
About six months ago in response to the uproar over the Bernie Madoff fraud, the SEC proposed updates to the custody rule that would require RIAs who debit fees from client accounts to be subject to surprise audits.
Needless to say, this proposal did not go over well, especially when costs for surprise audits were estimated to be north of $8,000.
Yesterday the SEC passed new custody regulations, and the surprise audit provision for RIAs who only debit fees was dropped. In addition, the SEC published a custody matrix, if you will, defining the different adviser arrangements along with their respective duties and responsibilities.
The folks over at RIABiz posted more about the custody provisions, plus they included the custody matrix chart for reference.
A new blog came to my attention when I was asked to be a guest blogger for the site.
The blog is called The Total View, published by John Luciano. Advisors may recognize John as the Director of Sales and New Business Development for Advisor Exchange, LLC, an aggregation and portfolio interface solution provider.
My post highlights the significant portion of revenues that advisors receive from qualified plans, but only after they’re rolled over into an IRA. Using account aggregation solutions, advisors can access data on held-away accounts to provide investment advice and calculate asset-based fees, increasing overall revenue for the firm.
Today I learned from this AICPA Journal of Accountancy tweet that the IRS has posted proposed regulations titled “Basis Reporting by Securities Brokers and Basis Determination for Stock” available for viewing on the Federal Register website.
I don’t quite have the time to browse the proposal right now, but thankfully the folks over at the AICPA JofA just posted a good summary of the proposal.
However, there’s no real insight as to what exactly the proposal means for independent financial advisers. Hint: It probably doesn’t change much of anything, as custodians are likely to bear the brunt of the regulatory changes. If anything, that means custodial fees likely will go up.
The comment period for this proposal is open until February 8, 2010 and a public hearing is scheduled for February 17, 2010. That will be a barn-burner of a hearing!
Looking ahead to 2010, I’m seeing more and more articles indicating that wealth management and financial planning firms plan to hire staff in the next 12 months (see InvestmentNews and Investment Advisor for examples).
But when the time arrives to hire for your firm, will you rely on providence or planning to find the right employee?
When I say rely on providence, I’m referring to firms that cast a wide net by posting want ads across the Internet and wade through the deluge of résumés that pour in. Yes, posting a job description on industry related sites is more likely to generate qualified candidates, but firms are hoping that ideal candidates are constantly watching the job postings for new positions. Hence the reference to providence.
So instead of relying on chance to find the right employee, advisors should turn to organizations that specialize in matching talented individuals with open positions.
I could spend a few paragraphs explaining how to install the bookmarklet and how it makes reading stuff on the Internet easier, but allow me to let the pictures tell the story.
So, out of the two identical articles below, which one do you want to read?
Update 12/22/2009: I uploaded a PDF of tweets containing the #FAiC09 hashtag, as they’re no longer available on the Twitter search site. Paragraphs below were updated.
Update 12/21/2009: Here’s an article from Davis Janowski at InvestmentNews discussing online conferences; No fuss, no muss, but forget about freebies. He highlights the Forbes iConference series among other events.
Attending the iConference was easy; fire up an approved web browser (Internet Explorer 6 or higher or Firefox versions prior to 3.5), log in, and the iConference was underway. There were three main areas of the iConference:
I try my best to keep up to date on the popular paperless office solutions on the market, particularly on those that are popular in the independent financial services industry. Every once in a while I run across reviews of solutions that are polar opposites of one another.
…its ease of use, low cost and robust features make it an attractive option for smaller advisory firms with limited technology and training budgets.
and…
For the price, PaperPort provides a great deal of functionality.
Sounds fairly promising. For $199, advisers can get an entry-level document management and scanning solution that provides some of the basic functionality needed to implement a paperless office. What’s not to like?
How did I find out about this resource? By chance, I was navigating the FPA national website looking for information related to my position as the incoming Technology Director for the FPA DFW chapter. Set over in the FPA News Brief section is a single-line link titled FPA President Part of Forbes.com Regulatory Webinar. I clicked the link and learned of the iConference.
Registration to the iConference is $75, but FPA members can attend the iConference for FREE. Here’s how.
Back in October 2008 I wrote about a passage in the 
I try my best to keep up to date on the popular paperless office solutions on the market, particularly on those that are popular in the independent financial services industry. Every once in a while I run across reviews of solutions that are polar opposites of one another.
