In the race to rebrand, go digital, attract private equity, embrace artificial intelligence, adopt ESG - and all the other modern trends - it’s often forgotten that what really matters to most clients is for their provider or adviser to be around for the long term.
There is a lot more to Financial Planning than adding up numbers or inputting data into a cashflow modeller.
There are certain stages in life when Financial Planning advice is vitally important and one of those periods is the years leading up to retirement.
A good financial plan will always need regular updating to stay on track as Financial Planners know, even if clients do not always appreciate this.
Financial Planning is not a solution to climate change nor world hunger but it is, on balance, a pretty good thing.
It is no surprise that the pandemic has nudged, encouraged and, to be fair, forced quite a few people to rethink their retirement plans.
FCA CEO Nikhil Rathi will have given recent critics of the regulator much of what they have demanded in his high profile Business Plan launched this week to much coverage.
As we reported last week, the CII’s recent crunch AGM saw a setback for rebels fighting against the deregistration of the Personal Finance Society.
The Personal Finance Society has always been something of a problem child for its parent the Chartered Insurance Institute.
I have to confess that I scratched my head this week when I heard the news that JP Morgan Chase was buying the loss-making robo-adviser Nutmeg.
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It was good to get away last week for a break to sunny Devon, beating the G7 hordes heading to the South West.
Clients are getting older, on average. It’s an inescapable fact that I was reminded of this week with the launch by St James’s Place of its Care Concierge service, aimed particularly at clients over-80.
During a call with a client last week, I was reminded again of the dangers of unregulated investments. The client explained that his good friend had lost £120,000 to a Bitcoin scam.
Whenever I hear of a new regulatory initiative designed to crack down on rogues or bad practice I always resist the temptation to cheer straightaway.