The complete conflict of interest that almost every financial advisor ( FAs) in their practice is a total disaster for clients. Except for FAs who operate explicitly under Fiduciary rules with a written commitment to always put the client’s interests first, almost all FAs receive compensation directly from the sale of their recommendations. You have no idea the impact this has on the entire culture at “broker dealers” like Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, UBS and all of their smaller brethren as well. It’s entirely about the sales revenues generated from client portfolios. Use only a registered investment advisor who in writing pledges to always put your interests first.
Rich
1 year ago
Ambiguity, disparity and hypocrisy. I find them all equally weighted and any investor can supply the proper comments for each.
John Wood
1 year ago
That they push for dereguluation, or non-regulation (think derivatives markets) at every turn, and then lay the flaming bag of excrement on the taxpayer’s door when they screw up royally because of excessive risk taking. They then move on with their massive severance packages, with nary a one suffering a consequence for their stupidity (except, maybe, the gang at Lehman).
medhat
1 year ago
Easily the near-institutional lack of legal accountability on the part of VC and private equity to leverage employee pensions and benefits as collateral to knowingly load up debt knowing that it’s likely to cripple a company. Then to walk away having pocketed short term profits while leaving rank and file employees jobless and broken. I can’t help but think there are legislative and regulatory means to significantly limit this from occurring, but suspect that these very very deep pockets have paid handsomely for elected officials to facilitate their practices.
Author
Jonathan Clements
1 year ago
There’s so much to choose from. But I think, more than anything, that I’m bothered by Wall Street’s attitude toward everyday investors. In the eyes of too many Wall Streeters, everyday investors are sheep to be shorn and naïve fools who buy and sell the wrong thing at the wrong time. Yet all those clever professional money managers collectively fail to beat the market—while all those supposedly foolish everyday investors have driven the explosion in indexing.
The complete conflict of interest that almost every financial advisor ( FAs) in their practice is a total disaster for clients. Except for FAs who operate explicitly under Fiduciary rules with a written commitment to always put the client’s interests first, almost all FAs receive compensation directly from the sale of their recommendations. You have no idea the impact this has on the entire culture at “broker dealers” like Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, UBS and all of their smaller brethren as well. It’s entirely about the sales revenues generated from client portfolios. Use only a registered investment advisor who in writing pledges to always put your interests first.
Ambiguity, disparity and hypocrisy. I find them all equally weighted and any investor can supply the proper comments for each.
That they push for dereguluation, or non-regulation (think derivatives markets) at every turn, and then lay the flaming bag of excrement on the taxpayer’s door when they screw up royally because of excessive risk taking. They then move on with their massive severance packages, with nary a one suffering a consequence for their stupidity (except, maybe, the gang at Lehman).
Easily the near-institutional lack of legal accountability on the part of VC and private equity to leverage employee pensions and benefits as collateral to knowingly load up debt knowing that it’s likely to cripple a company. Then to walk away having pocketed short term profits while leaving rank and file employees jobless and broken. I can’t help but think there are legislative and regulatory means to significantly limit this from occurring, but suspect that these very very deep pockets have paid handsomely for elected officials to facilitate their practices.
There’s so much to choose from. But I think, more than anything, that I’m bothered by Wall Street’s attitude toward everyday investors. In the eyes of too many Wall Streeters, everyday investors are sheep to be shorn and naïve fools who buy and sell the wrong thing at the wrong time. Yet all those clever professional money managers collectively fail to beat the market—while all those supposedly foolish everyday investors have driven the explosion in indexing.