Discretionary portfolio management is a form of investment management where all investment decisions are made by a Portfolio Manager or Investment Counselor for the client's account. The term "discretionary" refers to the fact that investment decisions are made at the Portfolio Manager's discretion.
Financial Planning is an ongoing process to help you make sensible decisions about money that can help you achieve your goals in life. It is all about setting goals and establishing a plan and timeline to achieve them.
The law says that you died “intestate”. That means that you died without leaving clear instructions as to how your property (real estate, investments, personal property, etc.) is divided and distributed. In these situations, The Ontario Succession Law Reform Act will govern how your property will be distributed. It’s also important to note that even if you want your property divided according to provincial law it’s still best to prepare a will. That way you can reduce delays and expenses.
MoneySense recently chatted with James P. Gunn, a Certified Financial Planner and Registered Retirement Consultant with Halton Wealth Management Inc., an independent wealth management firm. We asked Gunn about how Canadians can expand their search and find the money manager that’s best suited to their long-term goals.
The best strategy to manage investment portfolios is to have a plan that was in place long before a crisis begins. For example, your portfolio should be reviewed at least annually. In years like 2019 that produced exceptional returns, your portfolio should have been reviewed and very likely adjusted given the markets were at all-time highs. If you did that and reduced risk, you would have experienced less volatility during the early panic selling. This would also provide some investors with additional options for rebalancing when markets hit lows.
We put together some ideas and tips to help you deal with the financial impact many are facing during the pandemic.
What is causing the volatility in the markets in 2022? The answer is complicated, yet quite simple. People are worried about their future. When they worry, they become stressed. When they are stressed, they make poor decisions or delay making decisions. They start panic selling, stop investing because they believe markets will only go down. Lately, the markets are feeling the worry and stress of the people.
When does your Financial Advisor call you? What number on his call list are you? If you are an investor, this is something that you likely haven’t thought about, but should. To understand why this really matters, let’s say you are a client of a Financial Advisor that is not licensed as Portfolio Manager (PM) and thus does not have the ability to service discretionary accounts.
Let’s not forget, investors are human and many times act emotionally based on their biases. It’s who we are as individuals. It’s taken us decades to become who we actually are (not how we see ourselves). It’s very easy to come to conclusions and make decisions without giving much thought to the bias. I’ve often talked about “recency bias”. This is the tendency to weigh the latest information more heavily than older data. Investors often think the market will always look the way it does today or continue to perform as it did recently and make unwise decisions.
Risk tolerance comes down to how much risk you are willing and able to stomach. You should have a realistic understanding of your ability and willingness to stomach large swings in the value of his investments; if you take on too much risk, you might panic and sell at the wrong time.
When we are meeting with prospective clients, one of the questions we ask them is: what led you to your search for a new advisor? The answer that we most often get is that their current advisor no longer meets their needs. What we are told is that the advisor helped them to get to this point during the accumulation phase, but what they need now is someone that specializes in working with clients that are age 50 and over. This group is mainly focused on retirement income. They need to work with an experienced advisor that specializes in working with retirees and understands their unique needs.
The first reason is you have nothing to lose and everything to gain. Most professional Advisors will offer you a no obligation free review of your investment portfolio and written financial plan (if you have one).
As we look back at 2020, we are inclined to see ourselves as survivors of a year like no other. Sometimes when we view life through that lens we fail to identify opportunities that present themselves. One thing that 2020 did was to lower interest rates. This is a perfect opportunity to take a step back and look at ways that you may benefit from these lower rates.
Unless you are in a simple situation and you are the only beneficiary, perhaps the first question you should ask yourself is - do I need Executor Insurance before I act as an Executor?
Evening Appointments Available: Meetings available at place that is convenient for you.
