News & Insights

06 May 2007

What you need to find out about charges when selecting an IFA

In “Advisers face questions over who pulls the strings” (FT Money, 5th May), Elaine Moore reports that it is now very difficult for consumers to select an IFA based on how they charge. Correct. ‘Fee-only’ superficially holds out the best hope of avoiding bias, but it wastes an adviser’s ability to game the commission system for the benefit if their client. It is also often a sign that the firm is predominantly a financial planner and cannot or should not be managing investment portfolios.

read more Commentary by Stuart Fowler
28 Apr 2007

Fidelity’s new retirement solutions: why semi-customisation of large asset pools does not work

Fidelity are launching in the IFA community a new solution combining the accumulation of funds for retirement spending and regular drawdown from a fund after retirement. The offering recognises some key principles of retirement planning:how long we live means there is uncertainty about how long the fund will live if we deplete it at the ‘wrong’ rate; retirement dates are nowadays fuzzy rather than precise planning horizons; the assets funding retirement spending plans are not necessarily all held in a vehicle called ‘pension plan’.

read more Commentary by Stuart Fowler
15 Apr 2007

Update on real house prices

The Nationwide index in real terms was up 1.3% in the first quarter. Londoners have seen a feeding frenzy but the boom in financial and related services has renewed house price growth beyond the capital. Our long-run charts of real house prices are updated below. The unusual feature is not the degree of deviation from trend but its persistence – making lots of ’stale bears’.

read more Commentary by Stuart Fowler
09 Apr 2007

Drowning in debt: the American way

America’s insecurity after 9/11 showed in a desperate attempt to prevent recession by cheap and easy credit. Now the chickens are coming home to roost. An unprecedented house price boom was in large measure fuelled by this monetary expansion but it was also aided by lax lending standards from mortgage bankers and by new sources of liquidity from hedge fund investors – now as big as banks. In recent weeks we have seen the first signs of this foolhardy liquidity drying up, with several lenders to the dodgiest borrowers going bust and others shutting up shop.

read more Commentary by Stuart Fowler
01 Apr 2007

Changing the wealth management model

Published in Professional Investor, May 2007 (Article by Stuart Fowler)

read more News by Stuart Fowler
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