I have been blogging for a bit over three years now. This has been a great outlet for my love of writing. Working as a
financial advisor is about the best “job” one could have and I feel fortunate to be able to share what I’ve learned over the years with you.
Just as I often review the assumptions that I use in choosing investments to recommend to my clients, I thought it would be interesting to take a look back at a few of the prior posts on this blog and to update the underlying situations.
2010 The Year of the Fiduciary?
Well 2010; 2011; and 2012 have come and will soon all be in the books without a uniform Fiduciary Standard that must be followed by all financial advisors dealing with the investing public. I’ve read that this will be a top item for consideration among the regulators in 2013. I hope this is the case. One definition of Fiduciary:
fi•du•ci•ar•y – A financial advisor held to a Fiduciary Standard occupies a position of special trust and confidence when working with a client. As a Fiduciary, the financial advisor is required to act with undivided loyalty to the client. This includes disclosure of how the financial advisor is to be compensated and any corresponding conflicts of interest.
I think this is the right way for all financial advisors to treat their clients; some very deep pockets in the financial services industry disagree.
Is Your Financial Advisor Like a Replacement Ref?
I wrote this on September 26th of this year two days after the infamous Monday night game where the replacement refs robbed my beloved Green Bay Packers on a blown call at the end of the game in Seattle. This was the game that brought the NFL referee lockout to an end. Since then the Packers have won 7 of their last 8 games and stand atop the NFC North, Seattle has also had a good season and stands a 8-5 and are in the playoff hunt. Nothing in this update about finance but I have been a lifelong NFL and Green Bay Packer fan.
Lessons From the Groupon and Facebook IPOs
Since writing this shares of Facebook have risen to over $27 per share from just under $18 when I wrote this post in early September of this year. This is still far below the $38 IPO price in May, but the stock appears to be in the midst of a rally. Time will tell how the company fares as a publically traded entity.
Groupon went public at $20 per share in late 2011. The stock currently sits around $4.25 per share almost the same price as when I wrote this post in September. Since then there has been some excitement as at least one hedge fund has purchased shares and the Board retained founder Andrew Mason as the company’s CEO amid speculation that they had considered replacing him. Lastly there were some rumors that Google, a former suitor, was once again interested in acquiring the company at what would be a bargain price compared to their last offer. I fail to understand the economics of the daily deal “industry” and view this IPO as nothing more than a payday for the founders and the investment bankers.
That Nice Man at Church Wants to Sell Me a ….
Since writing this post in January of 2011, Bernard Madoff remains in jail, one of his sons committed suicide by hanging himself in his apartment, and four years after Madoff’s arrest the trustee assigned to try to recover assets has recovered about half of the $17.5 billion that investors lost.
In the interim another famous Ponzi schemer Alan Stanford has been convicted and imprisoned. Sadly financial fraud, including affinity fraud, is still rampant and all investors need to protect themselves.
Risk, Reward, and Peyton Manning
When I wrote this post in March the Colts had just waived Manning rather than pay him the $28 million due him at the time. Seemed like a reasonable bet at the time given that he was coming off of neck surgery and had missed the entire 2011 season.
Peyton ended up in Denver and has the Broncos on the cusp of the playoffs with 10 wins as I write this.
Meanwhile the Colts took Stanford’s Andrew Luck as the first overall pick in the draft and he has performed beyond expectations. He has the Colts in the playoff hunt after the team won only 2 games during 2011. Further the team has rallied in the face of adversity with their coach being forced off the sidelines to battle leukemia. Thankfully he is in remission.
Overall a win-win for both teams, both teams are so far being rewarded for the investments they made in Manning and Luck.
Just as with these blog posts, it’s a good idea to revisit your reasons for making financial and investment decisions to see if things panned out as you had thought at the time. This is not to second guess yourself, but rather to reexamine your assumptions to see if you need to adjust your decision making process in the future.
As always please feel free to contact me with your financial planning questions.
Photo credit: Wikipedia
Good post Roger, I love how you linked a lot of it back to football. I will be interested to see where we are over the next few years and if any regulations will come to fruition around IPO’s and HFT and the such. This is not to mention the Cliff and the hot air coming out of D.C. It’s a very interesting time to be sure.
John thanks for the comment. There is literally never a dull moment on the regulatory front. My biggest fear is that a watered down Fiduciary Standard will be enacted which in my opinion could be worse than no standard for the public. The Fiscal Cliff is certainly an issue, but my hope is that it will be like Y2K, much hype, little impact.
As for the football there are countless analogies to finance and investing. Big game on Sunday, I’m hoping the Packers can stay hot and beat the Bears.
Very nice article. I happen to follow Peyton Manning and like john, appreciate the analogy. You do a great job sticking to what’s really important.
Thanks Barb so far Denver’s investment in Manning is looking good. To your second comment what is more important than the Green Bay Packers (OK don’t answer). I’ve been a fan since the ’66 season, they won the 1st Super Bowl, Lombardi was the coach, and they had 9 future Hall of Famers on the roster. I thought this was the norm after they won again the following year, then almost 30 years of wondering through the “football desert.”