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By: Daniel Chen | March 5, 2010

I found this artcle to be very interesting. In order for Morgan Stanley to continue perpetuating thier practice of serving clients while maintainng thier army of brokers they have taken the following action. Even though brokers are looking to serve thier clients in a different fashion, MS will take action to not lose the revenue at all cost. Read this and enjoy.
“>http://www.fa-mag.com/fa-news/5234-morgan-stanley-sends-message-with-broker-suit.html

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By: Daniel Chen | February 19, 2010

This type of action continues to show all of us that the responsibility of qualifying a competent and trusted Advisor to work with still resides with the individual. The investor needs to educate themselves on how to decide on what type of advisor to work with. Investors need to ask questions, review certifications, review investment philosphies and more. Investors need to advocate for themselves today more then ever as demonstrated in this article. These type of criminals believe that if you work for a big brand name that is supposedly trusted, then no one will ever ask questions that may uncover thier fraudulant activities.
Copy and paste to a new browser;
Enjoy!!!

http://www.app.com/article/20100218/NEWS/100218072/1401/Former-financial-adviser-admits-scamming-investors-out-of-more-than-685-000

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By: Daniel Chen | December 20, 2009

“About.com” is a website that advocates for consumers through education to assist them in solving all types of problems. The article that is referenced by the link below does a great job in clarifying the difference in two types of Investment Advisors. It also references ” Paladin Registry” as a good resource. Enjoy.

http://moneyover55.about.com/od/findingqualifiedadvisors/a/costofbadadvice.htm

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By: Daniel Chen | November 18, 2009

There continues to be growing evidence that as the recession continues, more fraudulant activity will become increasingly evident. Scam and schemes will not be sustainable as the economic infrastructure continues to feel pressure. The following link to the most recent article is only one of many to come. http://bit.ly/Q3iE8

My advice to all individual investors continue to be ” if it’s too good to be true, it probably IS.”

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By: Daniel Chen | September 29, 2009

Warning Signs

Here is an issue that should raise a red flag should your financial advisor ever approach you with it. It is a fact that during very difficult and uncertain financial times, individuals are more susceptible to scams and fast money making schemes. Of course there are always a few ideas, no matter what type of times we are in, that have some credibility but never the less require extensive due diligence.
Ok, here is the latest red flag on my radar. I recently took on a new client from another advisor. Aside from the normal reasons for considering this change, the client sense of urgency increased when his previous advisor started to approach he and his wife about a "multi level" marketing business opportunity. Yes, you heard me right, the advisor presented to this client a multi level marketing campaign that promised easy and long lasting stream of revenue with minimum work on their part. I could not believe what I was hearing. I was absolutely astounded by this. What was this advisor thinking about? One would think that in these very uncertain times, when you get the opportunity to sit with your clients that you would focus on reassuring them of strategies that you have put in place for them to keep them on course for their future goals. I won’t talk about the name of this multi level campaign because it really doesn’t matter. What really matters is that this type of action on an advisors part should tell you a couple of things. One, if he is spending time on this, then what kind of time is he spending on helping his clients stay and keep on track in the new and ever changing environment that we are in? Two, if he is approaching his clients with this, is he having difficulty keeping his client base and urgently looking for another business to go into? Oh, by the way, I do not think that any compliance department in the country would allow an advisor to use his influence over his clients to engage them in another business that the advisor has an "upline" financial benefit in.

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By: Daniel Chen | September 29, 2009

This story just hit the news wires. The link http://www.fa-mag.com/fa-news/4513-broker-charged-in-massive-ponzi-scheme.html will take you to the complete article by, FA Magazine, a industry publication.
Read the article and see the lessons learned.

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