Breakaway Brokers

When dealing with millennials and often with more seasoned investors, it’s important to understand their barriers to acceptance of a boring approach to investing.

Here’s how to conduct yourself as an advisor if you want to demonstrate that you care about your clients.

Whether the discussion is about training, coaching, or consulting on roles and responsibilities, the topic of behavioral style – that is, sameness and differences – often gets missed.

Financial advisors are increasingly turning to social media platforms to expand their client base. But in today’s rapidly evolving digital landscape, the traditional marketing funnel model – comprising awareness, engagement, and conversion stages – often falls short when applied to these platforms.

If you’re finding referrals aren’t as plentiful or as easy to activate as they used to be, it’s time to ask yourself: is concentrating on referral hunting really worth your time?

It’s taboo in many cultures to admit you might want to have a life outside of your work, so a lot of people keep it to themselves because they don’t want to be seen as weak, or uncommitted.

The myth of work-life balance has perpetuated unrealistic expectations and unnecessary stress. By recognizing the fluidity of life and embracing a more flexible approach, you can find greater fulfillment and mental well-being.

Leveraging essential tools will energize teams, streamline operations, and drive growth. Financial advisors should actively promote education, training, networking, and personal development to foster a net wealth-supporting environment.

Trust is a precious commodity and the importance of authenticity cannot be overstated. Whether in healthcare, education, or business, being genuine and transparent is essential for building strong, lasting relationships. However, nowhere is this truer than in the financial advisory industry.

I love questions like this one – the chance to think creatively and brainstorm “what could be” without the stress of having to do something right now. I have some suggestions to start thinking about what you could do when you have more latitude and less financial responsibility.

AI and automation will revolutionize the financial advisory industry. These technologies enhance efficiency, improve client communication, and enable data-driven decision-making. By 2035, AI will be integral to most advisory firms.

As RIAs and broker-dealers consider how to allocate future spending, they would be wise to recognize how technology designed to support fee-for-service financial planning can help them meet their most immediate goals while also allowing them to grow and nurture next-generation wealth management clients.

Implementing the net wealth mindset in practice involves developing detailed financial plans that align with each client's needs and priorities, and crafting a client-centered service model.

Financial advisors can future-proof their businesses and maintain their relevance in an increasingly tech-driven world by combining human expertise with AI’s efficiency and analytical prowess.

The years-long parade of freedom-seeking advisors out of the wirehouses continues unabated. Meanwhile, consolidation of RIA firms, driven by private equity’s hot money, has similar momentum. Are these trends on a collision course?

How safe is your IRA? Not from economic ups and downs, but from your own vulnerability to scammers? While financial scams are often perceived as targeting senior citizens, younger generations are equally susceptible.

Tesla Inc. is expected to report another quarter of weaker sales, and it’s running out of alibis.

The US trucking market, which has been in recession for more than a year now, is poised to recover … at some unknowable point in the future.

No coach is going to be able to work well with your team unless you are very clear about expected outcomes. What will success look like in working with the coach?

Traders in the US rates options market are embracing a nascent wager on the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate path: a whopping 3 percentage points worth of cuts in the next nine months.

I have long admired Jonathan Clements. His columns in The Wall Street Journal introduced me to index-based investing. I was deeply saddened to read his column in HumbleDollar, dated June 15, 2024, that, at age 61, he has been diagnosed with lung cancer that has metastasized to his brain and “a few other spots.”

This article will outline the key steps and best practices financial advisors should take to become trusted advisors in the realm of cybersecurity.

This summer, countless bankers and financiers will get away to the Hamptons or vacation in Europe. And a handful will be traveling nearly every weekend — to play lacrosse.

Dell Technologies Inc. shares rose on Thursday after Chief Executive Officer Michael Dell said the company is building a “Dell AI factory” for Elon Musk’s startup xAI alongside Nvidia Corp.

This week’s column is devoted to brushing up on what you know you need to do well — and making sure you are actually doing it!

Understanding how to act ethically and appropriately as an advisor is apparently no easy task.

In this article, I will discuss what compliance officers do and the various factors advisors should consider in determining who should serve as their CCO.

You can’t sell the negative. Clients will vent negatives, but won’t buy them. You need to turn negatives into positives. Redirect Moving Away comments into Moving Toward Goals.

This third and final part of this series focuses on alternative energy sources, utility companies, and other companies related to the power grid infrastructure.

Traders are lavishing billions of dollars on quant-powered stock trades, boosting an investing style that’s struggled to gain traction in an era when simple bets on traditional large-cap indexes have paid off handsomely.

Artificial intelligence is sweeping across the economy. It’s showing up in the stock market with Nvidia’s meteoric rise, and the marketing blitz around AI is inescapable, whether from software providers peddling the promise of harnessed data to golf-club makers trumpeting an AI design. Narrow AI is now a real tool, and companies are figuring out how to deploy it.

JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s asset-management arm raised more than $500 million for a biotech venture-capital fund that will bet on the hottest corner of health care: weight-loss drugs.

Here’s why giving up the pleasure of talking will lead to more conversions.

Consider toning your prospecting efforts by prioritizing referrals and integrating them into your broader strategy for sustainable growth.

Wednesday is shaping up to be a doozy in the US bond market. Following the release of the consumer price index at 8:30 a.m. in Washington, investors will turn to the Federal Reserve’s policy rate decision at 2 p.m., which includes an update to policymakers’ carefully scrutinized economic projections.

General Motors Co. authorized a new $6 billion share buyback plan as improving profitability in its electric vehicle operations allows the automaker to return cash to investors.

Wall Street’s half-trillion-dollar business cloning quant trades has some surprising new customers: the very firms whose strategies it mimics.

It is essential for financial professionals to include a variety of sources of guaranteed income to give clients the freedom to worry less, gain confidence about the future and enjoy life more.

Will AI accelerate the consolidation trend, or could it be the great equalizer that allows smaller firms to remain competitive?

When clients express a pragmatic approach to their terminal diagnosis, respect their perspective. Acknowledge their desire to avoid prolonged suffering and financial burden. Assure them you will work diligently to help achieve their goals and honor their wishes.

You might think that having an ADA-compliant website is only about adhering to legal requirements, but it can actually help your firm grow.

Few advisors are prepared for the massive change coming to the advisory profession. It will not be a slow rollout over decades. In three to five years (if not sooner), how advisors do business will fundamentally change.

The most important thing when it comes to managing your time, priorities and life is to get your priorities straight in the first place. It can be helpful to think in categories: work, family, spiritual, health, charitable inclinations and so on.

Despite the availability of advance directives, many patients still receive aggressive, life-sustaining interventions that may not align with their preferences or improve their quality of life.

A manager’s role is to build upon their employees’ strengths, help them see how they can improve in areas where they are already strong, and make shifts in areas that aren’t working as well for them.

The idea that power is inherently corrupting has been repeatedly proven throughout history. From politics to business to religion, there are countless examples of individuals who succumb to corruption and abuse their authority.

Just as you lead a client to make the right investment choices, your web site should guide visitors towards taking a desired action, such as making a phone call, scheduling a meeting or downloading a resource.

Even though taste tests had confirmed that participants preferred the taste of New Coke, when presented with the reality of no longer having traditional Coke available anymore, consumers turned away from New Coke in droves.

A lot of financial planning software today is built to solve math problems, but what advisors really need to do is solve human problems.

Harness contrarian perspectives in a discerning manner – don’t be contrarian just for the sake of it.

It does you no good to meet with a prospect or client who doesn’t feel comfortable enough to be candid about what they want. Give them options, help them discover their goals, ask deeper questions and “prime the pump.”

It’s time to look at yourself and make a change.

A rally that has seen European bank stocks outpace both US peers and the Nasdaq over the last three years faces a key test in coming days when most of the region’s major lenders report results.

The path to responsible investing is complicated by individual differences in personality traits and decision-making processes.

By democratizing access to data, wealth management firms can future-proof, foster innovation, and develop new services and solutions that meet the evolving needs of their clients.

US mortgage rates climbed to a four-month high last week, potentially signaling a bumpier recovery for the residential real estate market.

Our profession is being transformed by powerful, AI-based technologies that will replace human-based financial advice. They will drive down costs, reduce valuations, and deflate the multiples paid in M&A transactions.