Nerd's Eye View blog

Weekend Reading for Financial Planners (June 23-24)

June 22, 2018 02:52 pm 0 Comments CATEGORY: Weekend Reading

Enjoy the current installment of "weekend reading for financial planners" – this week's edition kicks off with the official news that the Department of Labor fiduciary rule is really, truly, finally dead, as the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals finally issued its formal court mandate to vacate the rule.

Also in the news this week, following on the heels of the demise of the fiduciary rule, is the announcement that both Merrill Lynch and JP Morgan are considering whether to roll back their commission bans on retirement accounts as the fiduciary rule goes away (albeit to appeal to the subset of investors who actually wanted a commission-based account, because they didn't trade often anyway, and were unhappy that the firms were using the DoL fiduciary rule as an excuse to force them into higher-cost fee-based accounts). And this week's news also includes an important Supreme Court ruling in the case of Lucia v SEC, finding that the SEC's administrative law judges are improperly appointed... although ironically, the Trump administration had already begun the process of shifting away from ALJs and towards appointed judges for government agencies anyway!

From there, we have a number of investment-related articles, including: the ongoing (and perhaps inevitable?) grind of mutual fund fees towards zero, as fund families find other ways to get paid instead; how the pressure on mutual fund fees is starting to push upstream to custody and clearing platforms, that often boost the expense ratio of funds by as much as 40bps to cover platform fees that most investors mistakenly thing are going to the mutual fund company and its managers when they're not; and the last looking at how the rise of technology to manage large numbers of stocks may soon make it feasible for at least do-it-yourself investors to start creating their own rules-based investment algorithms that basically amount to their own personalized index fund.

We also have several additional articles on tax planning this week as well, from IRA planning strategies in 2018, to tactics to better manage investment advisory fees in a world where miscellaneous itemized deductions (including those for advisory fees) are no longer permitted, and a dive into the increasingly popular strategy for high-net-worth investors to get around the $10,000 deduction cap on property taxes by splitting up their real estate and transferring it in slices into a series of out-of-state non-grantor trusts.

We wrap up with three interesting articles, all around the dynamics of finding more productive uses for your time and energy: the first explores how, if you really want more time to connect with family and friends, the key is not to declutter your schedule with fewer obligations, but to add an obligation to your calendar specifically for family-and-friends time; the second looks at how the concept of "antifragility" can be applied directly in our own lives, especially when it comes to taking an ongoing series of small risks that give ourselves opportunity for a big outcome; and the last looks even further at how we can actually promote more serendipitous events in our lives, as research increasingly shows that "luck" is a material component of big success... but that some people are better at making their own luck with deliberate habits and strategies.

Enjoy the "light" reading!

The Problem With Selling ‘Hand-Holding’ As A Financial Advisor Value Proposition

June 21, 2018 02:52 pm 0 Comments CATEGORY: Personal/Career Development

In today's competitive environment, it is increasingly popular for financial advisors to talk about “behavior management” as a key value proposition for clients, as more and more studies have come out (e.g., Morningstar's Gamma, Vanguard's Advisor Alpha, and Envestnet's Sigma) showing that financial advisors can often more-than-recover the entire cost of their advisor fee just by helping clients to stay the course, not succumb to their investment biases, and close the behavior gap. However, while financial advisors may create value for clients through such hand-holding efforts, it's not clear whether marketing "behavior management" is actually an effective way to show our prospective forward-looking value to get clients to work with us in the first place. And, in fact, the message it sends could be driving prospective clients away!

In this week’s #OfficeHours with @MichaelKitces, my Tuesday 1PM EST broadcast via Periscope, we discuss why hand-holding is not an effective value proposition to communicate in order to get new clients, particularly in light of the way it forces prospective clients to awkwardly admit to themselves they've made mistakes in the past (in a manner they may not want to do!).

To understand why “You need an advisor to help you manage your behavior” is not an effective value proposition to win clients, put yourself in the client's shoes for a moment. Imagine a typical affluent individual who is approaching retirement with a $1 million portfolio, knows they need some guidance on making the transition (Social Security timing, retirement projections, etc.), and is perhaps even aware they've made some mistakes along the way (e.g., getting caught up in tech stocks during the late 90's, or a bad rental real estate purchase during the housing bubble). Such a financially successful individual may see the message "research shows bad investment behaviors can result in 1.5%/year or more of performance drag"... but being already financially successful, is more likely than not to assume they are one of the above-average individuals not being fully impacted!

Of course, the advisor can try to "convince" the client of the depths and extent of their problematic investment behaviors... but this can actually sour the relationship even more! For instance, imagine a client that did get caught up in tech stocks and the housing boom, and the prospective advisor says "Well, one of our primary value propositions is to help you manage your behavior so you don’t make those kinds of big mistakes again, that in the future could derail your retirement." From the client's perspective... mistakes may have been made, but this can feel like rubbing it in their face! And if a couple is involved, where usually one spouse is primarily responsible for managing their assets, now the advisor is asking that person to acknowledge, in front of their spouse, that they’re so bad at investing, and so hopeless and incapable of learning, that the only solution left is to just walk away and hand it to you, the advisor, to manage instead! Which to say the least, is an awkward conversation for any couple to have!

On the other hand, the reality may be that there's a niche of clients out there who already have internalized this message, and are looking for an advisor for these reasons (we may even see a lot of these clients since they tend to seek us out knowing they need help). But in the end, this may still only a small subset of investors. For the rest (who may be below-average investors, but they don’t know or realize it, or they still think they can improve and get better), trying to convince them that they need behavior management is doomed to fail because it requires them to make a very negative change about their own self-image… and most people just don’t want to do that! And it completely eliminates your chance to work with clients who simply want to pay you for your advice and expertise about all the other financial planning value-adds that we can bring beyond the investment portfolio and remedying investment behaviors!

Ultimately, the key point is to that framing hand-holding as a financial advisor value proposition may not always work, and, in some cases, may even alienate many of the prospects you are trying to win over. This may be true even when managing behavior actually is valuable for a client who is inclined to make those common investment mistakes (and, as a result, helping clients actually manage their behavior could be a good way to retain clients), but that doesn't necessarily mean that behavior management is a good way to convince clients to work with you in the first place! Or stated more simply, be wary not to underestimate the power of denial, for those investors who don't want to admit to themselves - and their spouses - of the mistakes they've already made along the way!

Financial Advisor (And Other Specified Services) Business Entity Choices To Maximize QBI Deductions

June 20, 2018 11:01 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Taxes

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) included the most substantial changes to the tax code that we have seen in over 30 years. The change which has garnered the most attention amongst financial advisors, though, is the new 20% deduction for Qualified Business Income (QBI). What's unique about the QBI deduction (also known as the IRC Section 199A deduction, or the pass-through deduction) is not just the size of the deduction (as a deduction of up to 20% of certain business income is certainly appealing!) but the fact that many financial advisors themselves will be eligible for a QBI deduction, albeit subject to some "high-income" limitations that some financial advisors will need to plan for in order to avoid having their QBI deduction phased-out entirely.

In this guest post, Jeffrey Levine of BluePrint Wealth Alliance, and our Director of Advisor Education for Kitces.com, examines how financial advisors (and other Specified Service Businesses) can maximize their QBI deduction through business entity selection, including why employee advisors may want to convert to being independent contractors, why S corps may want to convert to partnerships, LLCs, or a C corp (or not!), and why sole proprietors may not need to make any changes at all.

A key to understanding the new QBI deduction is how the "high-income" phaseout works. For QBI purposes, any Specified Service Business owner (including a financial advisor) who files a joint tax return with more than $315,000 of taxable income, or an individual who files under any other status with taxable income of more than $157,500, will be considered "high-income". And being "high-income" triggers a partial phaseout of the QBI deduction, and culminates in a total phaseout once taxable income exceeds $415,000 (joint) or $207,500 (other tax filers). Notably, since these thresholds are based on taxable income, it includes income from any sources (investment, spouse, etc.), even though the QBI deduction itself is calculated based on the business' income.

The reason business entity selection influences an advisor's QBI deduction is that not all compensation to an advisor (or other small business owner) is considered qualified business income eligible for the deduction in the first place. For instance, financial advisors who receive W-2 wages as an employee advisor are not eligible for a QBI deduction for those wages... which is why employee advisors may want to consider converting to become independent contractors (if their employer will allow it), as their sole proprietor income would be considered QBI. Income from partnerships or LLCs taxed as partnerships will generally be considered QBI, with the exception of guaranteed payments made to partners (which may mean advisors utilizing operating agreements with substantial guaranteed payments may want to reconsider this structure in light of QBI considerations). The good news for S corps is that so long as advisors can reasonably claim a lower salary, profit distributions (though not the wages portion) will avoid self-employment taxes and be considered QBI (although this extra incentive to push the boundary of what may be considered reasonable salary will also likely mean extra IRS scrutiny of S corp income). For C corp owners, wages again are not considered QBI, although such owners may still benefit from the newly reduced corporate tax rate of only 21%.

Ultimately, the key point is to acknowledge that business entity selection plays a key role in maximizing a QBI deduction as a specified service business owner (which includes financial advisors). And although many financial advisors (and other specified service business owners) may totally phase out the QBI deduction due to their high income, choosing the right business entity structure can help advisors preserve as much QBI deduction as possible!Read More...

#FASuccess Ep 077: Creating A Partnership Constitution To Formalize Decision-Making For A Multi-Partner Advisory Firm with Tanya Rapacz

June 19, 2018 07:01 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Financial Advisor Success Podcast

Welcome, everyone! Welcome to the 77th episode of the Financial Advisor Success Podcast!

My guest on today's podcast is Tanya Rapacz. Tanya is the co-founder of the Partnership Resource, a consulting firm that works with financial advisors partnerships to ensure that the partnership itself actually works, from formation, to the ongoing operation of the business, to succession planning.

What's unique about Tanya, though, is that before she was trained in dispute resolution and mediation, she was a financial advisor herself, who both worked successfully in a partnership, and went through a partnership merger that didn't work out, as she experienced first-hand what happens when the multiple partners of a partnership each want to take the business in opposite directions.

In this episode, we talk in depth about what it takes for a successful partnership to work, why it's necessary to treat a business partnership like a marriage (anticipating that some level of conflict is inevitable, and the key to long-term success is your ability to align on your goals and work through the conflict together), why multi-advisor partnerships with 3 to 5 partners tend to be the unhappiest (because of those challenging interpersonal partnership dynamics when the number of partners increases), how the largest advisory firms often have the most stable partnerships simply because they end out creating governance structures that facilitate the multi-partner decision-making process, but why any partnership may benefit from taking the time to create an agreement on how the partnership will make decisions in order to reduce their level of conflict.

We also talk about Tanya's own process working with partners, that starts with a series of personality assessment profiles to help current or future partners understand how to better communicate with each other, and the driving forces that motivate each other, the benefits of having a facilitator to help new partners talk through how key decisions will be made as partners and avoid reaching "easy agreements" that gloss over the challenging decisions like "which financial planning software will we use" that can tear a new financial advisor partnership apart, and how Tanya's partnership process culminates in an actual "Partnership Constitution" document, that formally spells out for all the partners how decisions will be made collectively going forward.

And be certain to listen to the end, where Tanya talks about how she's now beginning to scale up her "partnership compatibility reports" and assessment process with RIA Match, in addition to doing more facilitation with advisors directly as more and more advisory firms begin to form partnerships and merge to gain economies of scale in today's competitive environment.

So whether you are interested in learning more about how to manage relationship dynamics while working in a partnership, how personality assessments can help partners communicate better, or learning how you can form your own "Partnership Constitution" document to formalize decision-making, I hope you enjoy this episode of the Financial Advisor Success podcast!

Summer Reading List of “Best Books” For Financial Advisors – 2018 Edition

June 18, 2018 07:01 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Personal/Career Development

As the 2018 school season winds down and summer begins… it's time for the annual summer slowdown for most advisory firms, as client meetings get harder to schedule because they’re on vacation, and as advisors we ourselves have some time to relax with family... and catch up on good books.

As an avid book reader myself, I'm always eager to hear suggestions from others of great books to read, whether it's something new that's just come out, or an "old classic" that I should go back and read (again or for the first time!). And so, in the spirit of sharing, a few years ago I launched my list of "Recommended (Book) Reading for Financial Advisors", and it was so well received that in 2013 I also started sharing my annual "Summer Reading List" for financial advisors of the best books I'd read in the preceding year. It quickly became a perennial favorite on Nerd's Eye View, and so I've updated it every year, with new lists of books in 2014, 2015, 2016, and a fresh round last year in 2017.

And now, I'm now excited to share my latest 2018 Summer Reading list for financial advisors, with suggestions on books about everything from how to improve your financial advice so it actually “sticks” with clients, guidance on how to navigate your career path as a next generation “G2” advisor (or to hire one if you’re a firm owner looking to attract the next generation of talent), self-improvement books on how to better manage your productivity throughout the day or broader Principles to live and manage your life (and business), and an uplifting read on how the world continues to improve in amazing ways, and why the primary issue we face today is not the concerns of our political system or our economy or all the other dreadful drumbeats of negative news, but simply the ways that our own human instincts cause us to misinterpret (in a systematically negative way) the avalanche of information around us.

So as the summer season gets underway, I hope that you find this suggested summer reading list of books for financial planners to be helpful… and please do share your own suggestions in the comments at the end of the article about the best books you've read over the past year as well!

Weekend Reading for Financial Planners (June 16-17)

June 15, 2018 02:54 pm 0 Comments CATEGORY: Weekend Reading

Enjoy the current installment of "weekend reading for financial planners" – this week's edition kicks off with the news that the window for the Department of Justice to appeal the DoL fiduciary rule to the Supreme Court has passed, in what most believe is the fiduciary rule's final death knell... even as the 5th Circuit's clerk office has still not actually issued its formal mandate to actually vacate the rule.

Also in the news this week is an announcement by FINRA that it is beginning the process of overhauling the back-end technology that powers the CRD (Central Registration Depository) system that handles all the registration and disclosure details of FINRA-registered representatives (in what is anticipated to be a 3-year technology project to complete), and a fascinating study from the Boston Consulting Group that finds as many as 1/3rd of advisors are discounting their fees despite the fact that a mere 10% of clients are very fee-sensitive and fully aware of what they're paying in the first place!

From there, we have a number of behavioral finance articles, including the idea from Shlomo Benartzi that clients should "A/B test" their financial preferences before committing to a major financial decision, that our instincts as social animals to compare to other people is a driving force in our financial unhappiness (but can be 'managed' by getting a financially healthy role model instead), and a look at how the ongoing force of technology commoditizing products is leading advisors increasingly the direction of handling the more emotional aspects of clients' financial decisions.

We also have several additional articles on the evolving role of the financial advisor, including a look at how most younger clients actually need more financial advice and not investment advice anyway (which can be evaluated by looking at their human-capital-to-investment-capital ratio), a discussion from Morningstar's Don Phillips on the rise of the (non-investment) advisor, and an analysis by Bob Veres of how the evolution of the financial advisor over the past 40 years has arguably already so morphed the role of the advisor (and the role that commissions play in incentivizing advisors) that the SEC may be ill-equipped to handle the advisor of the future.

We wrap up with three interesting articles, all around the theme of the role our industry associations play in the financial planning profession: the first raises the question of whether the FPA will once again take up the fiduciary torch by suing the SEC over its watered-down SEC advice rule that exempts brokers from a fiduciary duty (after suing the SEC on a similar version of the same issue - and winning - nearly a decade ago); the second examines the CFP Board's new Code of Ethics and Standards of Conduct and how the organization has effectively shifted from a "two-hat" approach (with a fiduciary and non-fiduciary hat) into a "tattoo business" where the fiduciary CFP obligation cannot be removed once tattooed on; and the last explores the sticky question of whether we have too many professional associations and designations that create redundant cost and diluted advocacy, or if the reality is that we need multiple designations and associations to have a healthy level of competition amongst the organizations that serve financial advisors in the first place.

Enjoy the "light" reading!

When A Good Offer For A First Financial Advisor Job Really Isn’t

June 14, 2018 01:01 pm 0 Comments CATEGORY: Personal/Career Development

Getting started as a financial advisor is difficult, in a world where most job offers to become a financial advisor still require getting all of your own clients from scratch, and compensation is tied to the amount of clients and business the new advisor brings in. But the reality is that when a financial advisor is hired from the start to get new clients and generate their own revenue, it's not really a "financial advisor" job in the first place; it's a job offer to be a financial salesperson, as the key to success is not selling the advisor's time or expertise, but the company's products and solutions instead. Which for many (or even most) people, is a terrible way to start a career as a financial advisor.

In this week’s #OfficeHours with @MichaelKitces, my Tuesday 1PM EST broadcast via Periscope, we discuss why taking a position as a financial salesperson is not a good path to becoming a financial advisor, and how those who are interested in actually becoming financial advisors can pursue a better first job instead.

It is first crucial to distinguish between a financial advisor and a financial salesperson. Regardless of what title a company gives to their representatives (no one calls their representatives salespeople because “sales” is taboo, while “advisor” sounds professional), the reality is that when you actually look at the duties of jobs at especially a lot of large national firms that hire "financial advisors", these firms are looking for financial salespeople, usually because their business is the manufacturing and/or distribution of financial services products (e.g., insurance or investment products). The biggest clue is that you are expected to get your own clients from day 1, and that their training is focused not on earning the CFP certification and learning to give better advice, but on sales training, how the company's products work, and how to implement them in various client situations. In fact, new advisors often aren't even allowed to charge clients a separate fee for advice (or need to reach a certain level of production or experience before you will be allowed to)... because, again, these firms are hiring financial salespeople rather than financial advisors.

Fortunately, however, it is not this way at all firms. There are non-sales roles in the industry where you can work as a paraplanner or associate advisor in an existing advisory firm, where your job is to support an existing financial advisor and their clients, rather than bring in new clients - roles that are needed at firms that are actually in the business of giving advice to their clients. The caveat, though, is that firms hiring paraplanners and associate planners these days often want their candidates to have CFP certification (or at least to have passed the CFP exam), so if you are not at that stage, just getting your foot in the door (working in operations or another area) may be your best bet.

Ultimately, the progression of entry-level jobs in the advisory industry (from most to least preferred) would be: (1) a paraplanner or associate planner; (2) an operations, client service, or administrative job; (3) any other salaried job in financial services; and (4) a job as a financial salesperson (as long as you can afford to stay in the business if it turns out that you struggle with sales and getting new clients from the start).

But the key is to understand that the real “entry level job” to a career as a financial advisor is not to start selling products from day 1, and companies hiring "advisors" to do so are really hiring financial salespeople for a sales job instead. Fortunately, even if you don't succeed in an initial financial salesperson role, you can still move forward in one of the other entry-level positions, whether via association websites like the FPA or NAPFA, the CFP Board’s Jobs Board, or our listing of opportunities at New Planner Recruiting. Additionally, a growing number of large firms are realizing this challenge and increasingly hiring new advisors onto teams in entry-level support roles.

But if an honest assessment of your skills does not suggest you would be a good candidate for a sales role, then accepting a job as a financial salesperson is likely not the best path forward for you! And at a minimum, it's important to go into the role with your eyes wide open!

Universal Life Insurance Funding Strategies: Optimizing Death Benefit vs Cash Surrender Value IRRs

June 13, 2018 07:01 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Insurance

Before the development of universal life insurance, permanent life insurance was relatively straightforward. Policies had fixed premiums, fixed death benefits, and fixed interest rates generating consistent growth of cash surrender values over time. As a result, determining the internal rate of return (IRR) on policies was relatively easy. However, as “flexible premium” universal life products were developed in the early 1980s, policyowners gained flexibility to structure premium payments differently – introducing the possibility for individuals to place greater emphasis on either the IRR of death benefits or the IRR of cash surrender values based on their goals. However, because of the complexity of universal life insurance, many policyowners (and financial advisors) still remain unaware of this ability, and how to properly structure flexible universal life premiums to fully optimize either one of these objectives.

In this guest post, Rajiv Rebello of Colva Insurance Services examines various universal life insurance premium funding strategies, illustrating that in order to fully understand the dynamics influencing both death benefit and cash surrender value IRRs, it is crucial to understand exactly how the policies work, and in particular the interrelationships between cash value, death benefits, and cost-of-insurance (COI) charges, and the ways that changes in the Net Amount At Risk (NAR) compound over time.

Ultimately, the key point is to understand that strategies that maximize the long-term cash value of universal life insurance - which are all about minimizing the net amount at risk to reduce COI while managing the tax code requirements that there must always be at least "some" amount of death - and fundamentally different than the strategies to maximize the IRR of the death benefit of life insurance (which is driven by minimizing the amount of cash in the policy to maximize the net amount at risk and therefore the amount of money the insurance company must come to the table with in the event of death). Which means it is crucially important to pair the right funding strategy with the right policy structure in order to accomplish the long-term goals of a client with a particular flexible premium universal life insurance policy!

#FASuccess Ep 076: Why Financial Therapy Beats Financial Advice To Help Clients Change Their Behavior with Kristy Archuleta

June 12, 2018 07:01 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Financial Advisor Success Podcast

Welcome, everyone! Welcome to the 76th episode of the Financial Advisor Success Podcast!

My guest on today's podcast is Kristy Archuleta. Kristy is an Associate Professor in the financial planning program at Kansas State University, with a focus on teaching advisors how to actually change their clients' behaviors for the better.

What's unique about Kristy, though, is that she's also a licensed marriage and family therapist, and comes to the world of financial planning and how to help clients improve their financial behaviors with the perspective of a trained psychologist.

In this episode, we talk in depth about Kristy's work at the intersection of financial planning and financial therapy, how a financial therapist would view common financial planning challenges from a different perspective with different solutions, the way that therapists approach helping clients to change their behavior by recognizing that clients are the best experts in their own lives, and why according to the best practices research of therapists themselves, what financial advisors typically do – give advice with a comprehensive list of recommendations to their clients about how to improve their financial lives – is actually not a good way to get them to change their financial behaviors for the better.

We also talk about Kristy's work in helping to co-found the Financial Therapy Association, the development of a new Certified Financial Therapist (or "CFT") program they're developing, why Kristy anticipates that financial therapy will eventually become a specialization path for financial planners... and where the line should still be drawn between the end of what advisors can do by providing financial therapy, and when it may still be necessary to involve a fully licensed mental health professional on the client's behalf.

And be certain to listen to the end, where Kristy talks about her own upcoming transition, from teaching financial planning and financial therapy at Kansas State University, to joining the financial planning program at the University of Georgia, to hopefully help them build more insights from financial therapy into their core financial planning curriculum as well.

So whether you are interested in learning more about the intersection between financial planning and financial therapy, how financial therapy can help clients improve their financial behaviors, or how financial therapists can become certified through programs such as the CFT, I hope you enjoy this episode of the Financial Advisor Success podcast!

Celebrating 10 Years Of Kitces.com And Hiring For The Future

June 11, 2018 07:01 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Nerd's Eye View

In 2008, Kitces.com was first launched as a platform to showcase my new paid newsletter service, The Kitces Report, and to advertise my services as a speaker for financial advisor conferences, with a “grand vision” that my newsletter would help to draw interest for more speaking engagements, and that speaking in front of more advisor audiences would help me grow the number of paid subscribers to the newsletter. And on the side… I launched a blog, to share a few of my thoughts on financial planning strategies and industry trends that didn’t quite merit a full issue of the newsletter.

A decade later, the growth of the Nerd’s Eye View blog has surpassed even my wildest dreams, moving from a side project to the center of my business, built on a foundational belief that if we can stay focused on advancing knowledge in financial planning and helping real financial advisors to be more successful in their businesses and with their clients, that growth and other opportunities would come. And indeed they have, as the latest Erdos & Morgan study on financial advisor usage of digital media found that the Nerd’s Eye View ranks #1 for influence, objectivity, credibility, and simply being actually useful to financial advisors.

Given this growth, we’re excited to announce the addition to two new positions with the Kitces.com team. The first is a new Associate Editor role, to help us manage the ever-growing volume of content, readers, and behind-the-scenes logistics that are necessary to execute our growing media platform. The second is a new Senior Researcher, to replace Dr. Derek Tharp as he takes on a new financial planning teaching position at the University of Southern Maine’s business school. The Senior Researcher will help us to build a growing base of original research we aim to conduct directly through the Kitces.com platform, to help gain a better understanding of what real financial advisors actually do – from how they deliver plans, to how they price their services, how they use technology, and how they market and grow their advice-centric firms.

In the end, the goal of this growth and expanding the Kitces.com team is not to alter the service that we provide to the financial advisory community; instead, it’s simply to help us get even better at what we already do. Because in the end, a successful growing business needs more good people to be more successful and have a bigger impact to the community it serves. Which is true for both running a financial advisory firm itself, and also a platform that serves them. We’re nowhere close to being done yet, and I can’t wait to see what we can build to help the advisor community in the next 10 years from here!