Planning and Advice

What debt issue?

"There’s nobody here but us chickens with no debt issues" or at least that’s what Helmut Pastrick, chief economist of Central 1 Credit Union - the umbrella group for credit unions in British Columbia and Ontario - would have you believe.

|March 16, 2011

4 min read

Industry

Easy ways to enhance your business

I really did plan to eat healthier this year but after hanging out at my friend’s party a few weeks ago, I realized it’s tough to change your ways when hot wings, beer, chips and pizza keep calling your name — followed by the eventual moan from heartburn.

By Keith Pangretitsch |March 15, 2011

6 min read

Planning and Advice

Segregated funds offer protection

Financial advisors must make investment decisions for their clients based on whatever information is available at that moment, not unlike the physician who must make a diagnosis with limited information about his patient’s condition.

By Rod Tyler |March 11, 2011

5 min read

Planning and Advice

An IPS, your ounce of prevention

One area in the field of finance that has been growing in acceptance is that of behavioural economics- sometimes referred to as behavioural finance. In essence, it deals with the various intellectual and emotional errors that nearly everyone fact seems to make. Concepts like overconfidence, negative loss aversion, mental accounting, hindsight bias and anchoring have gained considerable acceptance in the financial services industry.

By John J. De Goey |March 9, 2011

4 min read

Independence both a blessing and a curse

With the recent acquisition of DundeeWealth Inc. by the Bank of Nova Scotia, the top 5 banks in Canada now control two thirds of the mutual fund assets under management and about one half of the licensed representatives that distribute mutual funds in Canada. It won’t be long until the disadvantages of an oligopoly will […]

4 min read

From asset allocation to risk allocation

The balance between return and risk is often equated with the trade-off between health and exercise. While all investors have an appetite for greater wealth (being healthy), they also have a limited tolerance for risk (exercise). Unfortunately, risk is a difficult, often abstract, concept for investors — especially when it comes to investment selection. As a result, risk is usually ignored altogether.

7 min read

Back-to-back annuities

Set it up and leave it alone. That’s the dream of every investor: a low-risk, high-yield investment that provides a guaranteed payment. Thanks to prescribed taxation, the power of arbitrage, and low interest rates, there is such an investment: the back-to-back annuity.

9 min read

What you need to know about IFRS

You’ve heard about International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), the biggest-ever change to accounting rules. Is it going to rock your world, or is it just a bunch of propeller-headed bean counters making much ado about nothing?

5 min read

Becoming the next superstar advisor

Anyone with kids knows pop star Justin Bieber was discovered via YouTube. Before long, his songs were getting millions of hits from a growing fan base and he was courted by Justin Timberlake and Usher at age 12. When I was 12, I wasn’t even courted by girls with pigtails.

5 min read

What’s a regulator good for? In Canada, not much

In my last column, I assailed the bad behaviour I see — and tragically, continue to see — from financial advisors. As seen in several news articles in the past few months, poor conduct is not limited to advisors: regulators are guilty, too.

5 min read