Enjoy the current installment of "weekend reading for financial planners" – this week's edition kicks off with the big news that the SEC has issued a new request for public comment on standards of conduct for brokers and investment advisers, raising the question of whether the SEC will finally act on a fiduciary rule, just as the Department of Labor's version takes effect on June 9th... and whether a new SEC fiduciary standard would help level the playing field for investment advice, or risk just watering down the fiduciary standard instead.
From there, we have a series of articles looking in particular at the broker-dealer industry as the DoL fiduciary rule rollout looms in the coming week, from a discussion of UBS's new compensation changes for retirement accounts (eliminating commissions and production payments in lieu of a simpler asset-based compensation system), to a look at how Merrill Lynch's commission ban and step away from wirehouse recruiting makes it look as though the company might be pivoting itself to become a giant national RIA, how Morgan Stanley is developing new technology to make its fiduciary advisors more proactive with clients, an industry survey of broker-dealer presidents finding that concerns about adapting to the DoL fiduciary rule have become all-consuming for most (to the point that they may be neglecting key investments into advisor technology tools), a look at the ongoing plight of the small broker-dealer, and whether the ongoing diminishment of the broker-dealer community may lead to the diminishment of FINRA itself (unless, perhaps, the organization reinvents itself as the new overseer of a uniform fiduciary standard?).
We also have a few more technical articles, including strategies to (legally) delay or minimize the impact of RMDs, the benefits of using a trusteed IRA (as an alternative to the typical custodial IRA arrangement), and how tolerance-band rebalancing strategies can increase returns (by helping to leverage market momentum, though not necessarily as much as just engaging in an actual momentum strategy!).
We wrap up with three interesting articles, all focused around the brain and how we think and learn: the first looks at how our brains actually take in and interpret information, driven primarily by a small section of the brain's left hemisphere whose job is to interpret what is happening around us (but given its limited information, the interpretation isn't always accurate or correct in its assessments!); the second explores the difference between "long-term" and "expiring" knowledge, recognizing that most people spend their time consuming the latter (e.g., news headlines and cable TV), and not enough on the former (obtained through reading books, and perhaps the occasional long-form blog post!); and the last looks at how, if you really want to make progress, the key is not just to set goals for yourself, but to establish systems that you can execute to get there... recognizing that if you're really good at creating effective systems for yourself, you may not even need to set goals in the first place!
Enjoy the "light" reading!
Welcome back to the twenty-second episode of the Financial Advisor Success podcast.
