Reading The Trades

Curiosity has gotten a lot of people in trouble. It also has created opportunities and satisfied our nature. There have been adventurers who have risked their lives to find out what was just across the mountain or pond. I get that same kick  not so much kayaking the Missouri but reading other professional’s trade magazine.

There are all kinds of trade magazines targeting brain surgeons to car lube franchisers. Sometimes business owners and professionals like to leave these specialty magazines out in their waiting rooms and I like to read them. The ‘trades’ not only inform but tattle to their constituents. (Has anyone read Variety?)

On that vein, and because I have very little creative juices going on today with my teeny gray cells, I thought I’d share notes and comments from my most current issue of Investment News.

• Ken Fisher, king of the investment mass marketing of managed accounts, said ‘Pimco’s new normal is idiotic and the next decade will be as good as the 1990s.’  Or so Kenny hopes and fingers crossed. Pimco, of course, paints a bleaker future but Pimco are basically bond folk and all bond folk are desperately depressing.
• Broker/Dealer fraud cases rose in 09, SEC says. Biggest scam? Mainly involved in Ponzi-like schemes. See what Madoff started?
• Investment News readers were really hacked at insurance companies who closed funds in existing variable annuity plans and replaced them with new funds that were not consistent with the old ones. Planners believe that insurance companies were doing this to ‘dummy down’ risk by offering less risky fund choices. Why this is a surprise to anyone over the age of 21 is beyond me.
• Big double-truck article on why not now buying gold makes sense. Reasons given: Too expensive, Fundamentals don’t jive, Not a good hedge, Watch it fizzle quickly & some clients may already own enough of the metal. The real reason is waay too expensive. Just say it and move on. This is what you get when you pay an author by the word.
• State Regulators are now concerned about (1) Small blind real estate investment pools (2) Structured products and (3) Gold scams. Whew! And I feel so silly spending the whole day wondering if I could use cold water with my Oxi Clean tablets.
• Jeffery A. Hirsch, editor in chief of the Stock Trader’s Almanac, predicts DJIA over 38,000 in an eight year super boom. To the best of my knowledge Jeff hasn’t been off any meds.
• Finally –1950 deja vu- blacklisted Russian spy stripped of CFP credentials. The Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards, Inc. revoked Russian spy Cynthia A. Murphy of her planning credentials. The reason is she failed to answer a CFP board’s complaint. Ms. Murphy had 20 days to answer.  Talk about a no-brainer. Supposedly Cynthia was a great financial planner and a lousy spy. It’s a timing thing- you can’t give client seminars and skulk around stealing secret plans without neglecting one job or the other. 

And that concludes, dear reader, another issue of Investment News. Questions call Paul @ 877 783 7080 or write him at pstanley@westminsterfinancial.com. Share this blog with someone who cares about their money.