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This week's guest on The Long View is financial advisor Harold Evensky, who Morningstar managing director Don Phillips has often called the "dean of financial planning."
Evensky is chairman of Evensky & Katz/Foldes Financial, and he's a retired professor of personal financial planning at Texas Tech University. Evensky has been extremely active in the planning community during his career. He's the past chairman of the International CFP Council, the CFP Board of Directors, the CFP Council on Examinations, and the Board of Appeals. Evensky is a frequent public speaker and has authored several books, including The New Wealth Management. During the course of this conversation, he weighed in on the SEC's newly approved Regulation Best Interest, calling it an "unmitigated disaster." He also discussed asset allocation leading up to and in retirement, his firm's application of a core/satellite approach, and different business models for financial advice.
Show Notes and References
Background (0:18-0:57)
Evensky explains why his practice opted to charge clients a percentage of assets under advisement instead of an annual retainer: "An unmitigated disaster." (0:58-2:51)
How Evensky and his fellow practitioners spend their time: "It's all built around the planning." (2:52-4:02)
On the firm's receptiveness to younger clients with less assets to advise: "Absolutely yes." (4:03-4:40)
The future: Comprehensive, modular financial planning. (4:41-6:49)
On the commodification of financial advice: "To the general public … it pretty much looks like the same service." (6:50-7:37)
On robo-advice: "Our conclusion was ... it's dangerous." (7:38-11:15)
Helping clients navigate turbulence: "Our goal is to call the client before they call us." (11:16-12:15)
The critical importance of communicating with clients: "Brokers and, much to my surprise, trust officers … hide under their desks." (12:16-13:02)
Where risk tolerance and client-specific circumstances come to the fore and human capital and age take a back seat: "Everything calls for a customized mix." (13:03-15:25)
• Human Capital
"That's horribly inefficient." How Evensky came to embrace the simplicity of the core-and-satellite approach to portfolio construction. (15:26-19:27)
Evensky's construct for "explore" positions: "It can be most anything." (19:28-20:37)
Value's dry spell: "The basic concept of the value premium remains viable." (20:38-22:19)
• Dimensional Fund Advisors
Permanent impermanence: How Evensky and his colleagues grapple with investing ephemera. (22:20-23:58)
Global diversification: "We've always believed in an international exposure." (23:59-25:45)
• Home-bias definition
Risk tolerance and return needs drive strategic asset-allocation decisions: "Our maximum equity allocation is 80%." (25:46-27:53)
"Rebalancing is an immensely powerful tool, painful though it is in the short-term." (27:54-30:44)
Human capital's influence on the planning process: Car salesman versus tenured professor. (30:45-32:42)
Ramping up equity exposure through retirement: "Intellectually I think it's very sound research; but from a behavioral standpoint I don’t think it's realistic." (32:43-34:24)
The simple two-bucket approach: "My experience is the relatively small opportunity costs (associated with the bucketing approach) are way outweighed by the behavioral benefits." (34:25-38:24)
• Testimony of Deena Katz, CFP, on "Boomer Bust? Securing Retirement in a Volatile Economy" before the Senate Special Subcommittee on Aging, Feb. 25, 2009 (see Page 7 for "paycheck syndrome").
Time- and goals-based bucketing: "A great deal of appeal but they don't make any sense." (38:25-39:19)
How the complexion of retirement has changed: People will have to work longer. (39:20-41:32)
"Where's the protection of the investor?" Evensky takes a dim view of the SEC's just-finalized Regulation Best Interest measure. (41:33-43:34)
• "A New Rule Won’t Make Your Broker an Angel" by Jason Zweig, The Wall Street Journal, May 31, 2019.
Competency standards: Professionalism subsumes competency. (43:35-46:57)
About the Podcast: The Long View is a podcast from Morningstar. Each week, hosts Christine Benz and Jeff Ptak conduct an in-depth discussion with a thought leader from the world of investing or personal finance. The podcast is produced by George Castady and Scott Halver.
About the Hosts: Christine Benz and Jeff Ptak have been analysts and commentators on investments and the investment industry for many years. Christine is Morningstar's director of personal finance and senior columnist for Morningstar.com. Jeff is head of global manager research for Morningstar Research Services, overseeing Morningstar's team of 120 manager research analysts in the U.S. and overseas.
To Share Feedback or a Guest Idea: Write us at [email protected]
Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
Is there a retirement crisis in the United States, and what role does the government have in improving the system? What's the current status of a fiduciary standard for financial advice?
Aron Szapiro, Morningstar's director of policy research and our guest for The Long View podcast, obsesses over these topics. In his role, he and his team conduct research on various matters of public policy and formulate views on policy proposals under consideration by Congress and regulatory bodies. Szapiro has testified before Congress, and he has an inside view of how Washington works: Before venturing into the private sector, he was a senior analyst in the U.S. Government Accountability Office, and he also worked for the New Jersey state legislature.
In this wide-ranging interview, Szapiro defines Morningstar's approach to policy research and homes in on some of the policy matters dominating our discourse today: whether financial advisors should be held to a fiduciary standard, how the U.S. retirement system might be improved, and whether meaningful retirement legislation can make it through partisan gridlock in Washington.
This conversation was recorded on April 30, 2019. Since then, the House passed the SECURE Act (on May 23); that legislation has provisions related to annuities in 401(k) plans, multiple employer plans, and required minimum distributions. As of June 11, 2019, the provisions have not passed the Senate. And the Securities and Exchange Commission approved a final version of Regulation Best Interest, which aims to hold broker/dealers to a higher standard of care than was previously required.
Show Notes and References
Background and Professional Development
• 10 Millennials Making Their Mark on Washington and Beyond
Policy Research
How his team avoids conflicts with Morningstar's business interests: "What would be best for investors and what evidence do we have to support that position?" (4:56-6:25)
How his team works to ground policy recommendations in the data: "What we don't do is we don't try to make values-based arguments." (6:26-8:25)
On whether investors are shaping the investment landscape more than policymakers are: "It's in government's long-term interest to make sure we have a system that protects and empowers people to save and make some decisions." (8:26-10:35)
Policy Matters Today
States' role in creating policies that affect investors: "I hope these things build toward a federal solution." (14:54-16:58)
What will drive substantive change in Washington with respect to the investment and retirement landscape: "It's a very slow-moving ship." (16:59-19:51)
The State of the U.S. Retirement System
How to measure retirement adequacy: "People should be able to sustain their standard of living that they had during their working lives in retirement." (22:49-24:13)
Whether today's retirees are running out of money, and how we would know. "You don't want to do policy by anecdote." (24:14-26:38)
On the bifurcation in retirement-plan quality between big and small employers. "Small employers are busy keeping the lights on." (26:39-29:22)
On whether the Thrift Savings Plan for federal workers should be available to more workers. "It's great as a model that others can aspire to." (29:23-31:50)
About the Podcast: The Long View is a podcast from Morningstar. Each week, hosts Christine Benz and Jeff Ptak conduct an in-depth discussion with a thought leader from the world of investing or personal finance. The podcast is produced by George Castady and Scott Halver.
About the Hosts: Christine Benz and Jeff Ptak have been analysts and commentators on investments and the investment industry for many years. Christine is Morningstar's director of personal finance and senior columnist for Morningstar.com. Jeff is head of global manager research for Morningstar Research Services, overseeing Morningstar's team of 120 manager research analysts in the U.S. and overseas.
To Share Feedback or a Guest Idea: Write us at [email protected]
Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
Our guest on this week's podcast is Michael Kitces. Michael is a partner and the director of wealth management for Pinnacle Advisory Group, a Columbia, Maryland-based wealth management firm that advises on about $1.8 billion of assets. In addition, he is a co-founder of the XY Planning Network. As the host of the Financial Advisor Success podcast and the publisher of the popular financial planning industry blog Nerd's Eye View, Michael has established himself as one of the most prolific and insightful commentators on the financial advice business. A fixture on the speaking circuit and in the media, Michael often addresses key trends and innovations in the way advisors serve their clients; our interview with him focused on the future of the financial advice business.
Show Notes and References
Background and Professional Development
Dad’s old life insurance policy: How a wedding gift led Michael down a path to a career in the financial services industry (2:52-4:21)
“He was just a really different guy than everybody else”: Michael’s recounts his breakthrough realization that he wanted to be a financial planner (4:22-6:07) ·
How Michael used his pre-med training to overcome a crisis of confidence that he didn’t know what he was doing: “I probably shouldn’t be giving them advice; I’m going to hurt someone” (6:08-7:31)
Going deep to differentiate: “I’m going to get really good at these annuity benefit riders” (7:32-8:45)
Behavioral Finance in Practice
Persuasion: Using psychology and coaching to help clients overcome their biases (11:41-13:01)
“Most of us just don’t want to say that about ourselves”: Clients don’t hire us to save them from themselves, but to get on a better path and save time (13:02-16:37)
“Zoom the camera out a little bit”: The key to helping clients through difficult times is being available, clearly communicating, and setting context (16:38-18:18)
“There’s very little research at all about what you’re actually supposed to do about this stuff” (18:19-19:56)
Financial Advice: Evolution and Great Leaps
Computers disrupted the stock-broker model and the internet disrupted the mutual-fund model. Michael on why he thinks software will disrupt the fee-based asset-allocation model (22:15-24:06)
An S&P 500 index fund just for you: “Technology is going to allow us to completely disintermediate not just mutual funds but most of the ETF complex as well” (24:07-25:36)
The Future of Advice
“(Saying) ‘Oh no one’s ever going to want to work with an advisor virtually; it’s all in person’ … is like clothing stores insisting that Amazon was no threat to them 20 years ago” (30:26-32:56)
Technology leaps like robo-advice are less of a threat to the financial advisor than to the the back- and middle-office that supports them (32:57-33:54)
The great inversion: In the future, advisors will charge for financial-planning services and give away investment management for free (vs. today where the opposite often holds true) (33:55-35:36)
Best Practices for Delivering and Paying for Advice
A question of when, not if, more exacting financial-advice standards will arrive: “The U.S. has become a laggard on fiduciary and competency standards” (39:21-43:21)
We can’t do financial advice for young people? Michael on why that’s ridiculous and how flat-fee or subscription-based advice will come to fill that void (43:22-46:51)
“I don’t … see anything wrong with the AUM model”: Why charging a percentage of assets-under-advisement makes sense for some clients, but will become less common in the future (46:52-48:56)
When it does and doesn’t makes sense to pay for financial advice by the hour (48:57:51:47)
About the Podcast: The Long View is a podcast from Morningstar. Each week, hosts Christine Benz and Jeff Ptak conduct an in-depth discussion with a thought leader from the world of investing or personal finance. The podcast is produced by George Castady and Scott Halver.
About the Hosts: Christine Benz and Jeff Ptak have been analysts and commentators on investments and the investment industry for many years. Christine is Morningstar's director of personal finance and senior columnist for Morningstar.com. Jeff is head of global manager research in Morningstar Research Services, overseeing Morningstar's team of 120 manager research analysts in the U.S. and overseas.
To Share Feedback or a Guest Idea: Write us at [email protected]
Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
Our guest for this week's installment of The Long View podcast sits at the busy intersection of healthcare and financial planning. Carolyn McClanahan was a practicing physician for a number of years, but after a frustrating search for a financial planner for her and her husband, she decided to study financial planning and earned the CFP designation. In 2004, she founded financial planning firm Life Planning Partners, and serves as the firm's director of financial planning. She also co-founded Whealthcare, a software program that identifies and troubleshoots age-related financial risks.
Carolyn strongly believes that individuals and financial advisors should think proactively about the implications of aging for healthcare and financial planning. She is also sought-after as a public speaker and a media expert on matters of aging, healthcare, and personal finances.
Show Notes
Frustrated: How disappointing experiences with financial advisors spurred Carolyn to pursue a career in financial planning (3:33-4:56)
"It worked beautifully": Why Carolyn decided to charge flat fees for her planning services instead of taking a percentage of client's assets (4:57-6:50)
"It's a lot harder": Carolyn explains why the flat-fee model isn't more commonplace, how they determine the right fee for each client, and why it makes economic sense (6:51-8:44)
An "ensemble model": How Carolyn built her practice and how she hones her focus (8:45-13:01)
A piece, not the whole pie: The role investments play in a client's financial plan (and how to avoid expectation gaps) (13:02-14:43)
The healthcare spending conundrum: "We spend so much money on end-stage healthcare that really doesn't help anybody." (14:44-17:39)
Heal thyself: "We're going to start seeing lawsuits from employees…about employers not being good purchasers of (health) insurance" (17:40-19:35)
Primary care as a public service: Carolyn's ideal healthcare system puts community health centers at its core (and removes primary care from insurance coverage) (19:36-22:35)
How to address the big-four "aging planning" issues: When to stop driving, when to move, when to get help with financial decisions, when to get help with healthcare decisions (22:36-26:02)
How to take the keys away: Addressing the issue of aging parents who shouldn't be driving anymore (26:03-28:08)
Bringing the family together: "90% of fraud and abuse is done by people close to you" (28:09-30:36)
"It's been a beautiful thing to use": How Carolyn employs "engagement standards" to align expectations and ensure clients commit to the plan (30:37-32:42)
Cognitive decline: "A client's biggest risk to their financial security is actually themselves" (32:43-34:33)
How to plan for healthcare spends: Live healthy, work as long as you can, reflect on how you use healthcare (34:34-37:52)
Whealthcare: A programmatic attempt to project and plan for healthcare costs (37:53-39:02)
A construct for long-term care planning: "People who are very healthy are going to have a longer long-term care need; people with dementia have an average long-term care need; if you're very unhealthy you don't have to worry about long-term care." (39:03-42:10)
Paying for long-term care: Carolyn suggests setting aside a "bucket" of money to self-fund long-term care, which avoids problems with acceptance into nursing facilities and complexity of long-term care insurance (42:11-45:20)
"There's more to money than just the numbers": Why hybrid long-term care insurance isn't usually a good answer, but sometimes piece of mind makes up for its opportunity costs (45:21-47:45)
How to avoid cognitive decline: It's not all hereditary, so learn as much as possible and live a healthy lifestyle (47:46-50:31)
Other ways to anticipate and manage cognitive decline: How a checklist helped a client determine he was suffering a series of mini-strokes (50:32-53:29)
References
Whealthcare
National Association of Personal Financial Advisors (NAPFA)
Employee Benefit Research Institute
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Our guest in this special bonus episode of The Long View podcast is Tim Buckley, chairman and CEO of the Vanguard Group, which manages over $5 trillion in assets globally. Tim took the helm at Vanguard in January 2018, succeeding Bill McNabb. Tim is a longtime Vanguard veteran, having joined the firm in 1991. Before assuming his current role, he served as Vanguard’s chief investment officer, head of its retail investor group, as well as its chief information officer.
Show Notes
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Our guest for this week's installment of The Long View podcast is Morgan Housel. Morgan is a partner at the Collaborative Fund, a venture capital firm that makes investments in firms that in its words are "at the intersection of for-profit and for-good." A former columnist at The Motley Fool and The Wall Street Journal, Morgan has become one of the most prolific and insightful writers on the investment decision-making process, as evidenced by his impressive body of work on the Collaborative Fund website's blog.
Show Notes
"The ability to write a check is no longer a competitive advantage": What Collaborative Fund does, why Morgan was drawn to it, and the role content plays in its strategy (3:05-5:05)
"There’s no other industry in the world where the rewards are as big as in finance": How big paydays can distract focus from everyday work (21:18-23:42)
References
About the Podcast: The Long View is a podcast from Morningstar. Each week, hosts Christine Benz and Jeff Ptak conduct an in-depth discussion with a thought leader from the world of investing or personal finance. The podcast is produced by George Castady and Scott Halver.
About the Hosts: Christine Benz and Jeff Ptak have been analysts and commentators on investments and the investment industry for many years. Christine is Morningstar's director of personal finance and senior columnist for Morningstar.com. Jeff is head of global manager research in Morningstar Research Services, overseeing Morningstar's team of 120 manager research analysts in the U.S. and overseas.
To Share Feedback or a Guest Idea: Write us at [email protected]
Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
Our guest for this week's installment of The Long View podcast is Morningstar managing director Don Phillips. Don was Morningstar's first mutual fund analyst and eventually became CEO of the firm; he established Morningstar's independent voice and mentored scores of analysts. He also helped develop many of the tools that investors today take for granted, such as the Morningstar Style Box and the Morningstar Rating for stocks (also known as the star rating). Throughout his career Don has worked to enact positive change in the fund industry, speaking out on issues such as misleading advertising and high-fee funds as well as the need for better shareholder disclosures.
Building Fund Research
Achieving Better Outcomes
The Future of Funds, Advice, and Research
References
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Our guest this week is noted author and advisor, William Bernstein. Bill’s background and entree to finance is unique—a neurologist by training, Bill self-taught himself the principles of investing and asset allocation, eventually parlaying that knowledge into a successful financial advisory practice and a series of influential, critically acclaimed books such as "The Intelligent Asset Allocator." In this conversation, we explore Bill’s background and how it shaped his development and thinking as an investor and how he applies those lessons in working with clients who are trying to meet goals like a comfortable, secure retirement.
• “I had to figure out how to save and invest on my own”: Bill’s crash course into investing and constructing a portfolio (1:29)
• “The Arithmetic of Active Management” by William F. Sharpe
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