FTAdviser.com

This time last year, the Pensions Act 2008 had only just received Royal Assent and, at the time I emphasised our commitment to getting on with the delivery of the scheme in 2009. This situation hasn’t changed, but things have certainly moved on apace.
Read More »

Next year should bring greater clarity for financial advisers about the regulatory environment that we all work in.

There will be a general election and I hope this happens sooner rather than later to remove that uncertainty from all our lives.

When we know who is going to be in government we should get clarity on exactly how the Retail Distribution Review will unfold and advisers and product providers can get on with positioning their businesses for future success.

Read More »

Ibiza is one of the most quintessentially Spanish Islands in the Mediterranean and ranks alongside some of the most serene and beautiful places I’ve ever been to.

Why then, do so many people ask if I’m either off my head or going through a mid-life crisis when I tell them I am going there on holiday?

It seems that most people think Ibiza is not actually an island, but rather a massive amplifier, pulsating to a Balearic beat and populated entirely by drunken and dazed clubbers.

Don’t get me wrong, there is a good night out to be had for those looking for this kind of adventure, but in the main the island is a lot quieter and more sophisticated than people give it credit for.

This is only one of the many inconsistencies between perception and reality in today’s world and there are a whole lot more to be found in the investment market.

Take debt, for example.

Read More »

For all who follow the Personal Accounts Delivery Authority and its activities, you will no doubt be aware that GWRS withdrew as a bidder from the procurement process this week.

I feel it is important to provide the facts for people interested in our work so that they can see how our procurement is progressing.

Read More »

As we all digest the announcements in the pre-Budget report, readers of FTAdviser.com will almost certainly have read the speculation around the scheme’s implementation.

This sort of comment is not unusual. But as chief executive of Personal Accounts Delivery Authority, I feel it is important to provide the facts and give an update to the media.
Read More »

Money Guidance is on track in reaching 500000 people in northern England and apparently is proving effective in helping people deal with their finances, from making an informed decision when choosing financial products to dealing with debts before they get out of hand.

So £20m is to be spent on rolling out the service nationally.

Read More »

Did the pre-Budget report bring any positive news for anyone?

The chancellor had some major targets to hit - and could have seized the opportunity to start to confront some of the UK’s most pressing social problems.

With an ageing but under-pensioned society where were the proposals to increase pension provision - let alone start the debate about the type of retirement society now wants?

Was the apartheid of public vs private sector pensions addressed?

I simply don’t think the £1bn extra that public sector employees will pay or the 1 per cent extra national insurance contributions they will be paying in 2011 is sufficient to address the root cause of the problem.

Read More »

The move by Barclays is a clear signal of how competitive the fight for talent could become between the banks – with workers, on the one hand, squeezed by politically-charged moves on pay, while banks independent of state support find themselves in pole position to provide more generous remuneration and embark on a head-hunting spree in the future.

Such an outcome would be as damaging for taxpayers as it would be for shareholders.

Read More »

In general, asset allocation to China tends currently to be buried within allocation to Asia or emerging markets.

In coming years, we believe that, given growth in capital markets, China will emerge as a major asset class for international investors and command its own allocation in portfolios.

The logic becomes clear if one considers that:

* Asia dominates the MSCI Emerging Markets Index (which comprised 24 per cent of the capitalisation of world markets at the start of July 2009) and this increases the likelihood of increasing allocation.

Read More »

It is easy to talk a good game. Indeed this may be the only thing that economists and market analysts actually excel at on a regular basis.

However when it comes to walking the walk none can compete with Warren Buffett.

Dubbed as the Sage of Omaha, the two big differences between Mr Buffett and the thousands of commentators that predict our financial futures is that he puts his hard earned cash on the line and that he is generally right.

In buying the Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad company, Mr Buffett has just made his biggest investment ever.

Read More »

While mortgages were placed firmly ringfenced from the Retail Distribution Review (with something of a dotted line now that we have MMR), the future of protection was not so clear, giving rise to rumour and debate about whether commission, a variation on procuration fees or upfront fees would thrive in the post 2012 market.

Officially, the jury is still out and the FSA has announced that RDR read across for the protection industry will not be communicated until next year.

But for all those wrestling with whether there be consumer detriment if the FSA neglects to regulate the sale of pure protection products under Icob, the simple matter of the £trillions of protection gap – and the government’s desire to mitigate the burden of the underinsured - will probably make this a moot point.

Read More »

As the public digests the mind-boggling figures of the second bank bail-out, attention is now turning to potential acquirers of the banking assets being put up for sale by RBS and Lloyds.

Read More »

Building a pension scheme aimed at the millions of low-to-moderate earners who don’t have access to a workplace pension scheme is no small task.

As financial services professionals, many of you will be well versed in the role of the Personal Accounts Delivery Authority (Pada) and the pension scheme we are designing - which aims to fill the gap for people who are currently not saving and complement existing provision.

Read More »

The BBC recently reported that workplace pensions are more popular, with 9m people paying in during 2008. I wonder if the increase has something to do with employers using auto-enrolment. I hope so.

The general feeling across the industry is that auto-enrolment is a positive step to getting people saving for their retirement. But will auto-enrolment have enough impact to change the pension landscape? The answer is a complex one.

Read More »

The recent postal strikes got me thinking back to the days when the adviser world was wholly paper-based. The impact of a strike in those days would have had a severe impact on advisers’ business.

Read More »

It has come to my notice that there is a lot of “noise” surrounding the issue of firms merging or making strategic changes ahead of RDR, like last week’s announcement of the tie-up between Towry Law and Edward Jones, but there isn’t much “noise” surrounding the advisers within those firms.

Read More »

The submission deadline for consultation responses to the latest Retail Distribution Review consultation is rapidly approaching.

The Association of British Insurers (ABI) fully supports the main principles of the RDR, although we believe that a number of important issues should be given further consideration before it is implemented.

We are extremely concerned that proposals such as adviser charging, and the new prudential rules for advisers, will, perversely, reduce consumer access to financial advice. It is a major concern that the proposals, as they stand, could lead to a reduction in the number of consumers accessing advice - completely the opposite intent of the reform plans, going against the very heart of what the FSA has declared as a key outcome from the RDR.

Read More »

So the UK is suffocating under a mountain of debt and we are set to go to hell in a basket.

Income tax has got to rise, government spending has got to be slashed, decades of misery await.

The truth is not like that at all, however.

Sure there are problems ahead, but very rarely are the true challenges pointed out.

The truth is, by historical standards our fiscal deficit doesn’t look that alarming at all.

Read More »

Given the tightening of lending criteria and the drastic reduction in funds available for borrowing, introducing new rules forcing borrowers to provide evidence of their income is purely academic – a bit like locking the gate after the horse has bolted.

Self cert mortgages aren’t bad.

Implemented correctly, self cert mortgages provided a solution to the very real problem affecting a sizeable niche of borrowers who were unable to prove their annual income and would have been penalised by traditional affordability criteria.

Changing employment patterns meant that it wasn’t just the self employed that were attracted to these types of loan.

Read More »

The FSA have updated its “free” parent’s guide to money. Wait a minute… IFAs are paying for that.

Last year the FSA launched the parent’s guide to money which, as you may know, is a booklet and CD Rom that midwives are being asked to distribute to parents by the FSA.

This booklet is free to parents and contains a lot of important tips such as informing people that they may have to buy a buggy for a baby.

It has a few nice calendars that you can fill in with your own dates on “Baby smiled for the first time” and “First trip to the park”.

Oh, and there is quite a lot of information on state benefits; but more on that later.

Read More »

We are hearing whispers that the FSA will look to stop self certification in its consultation paper due out next week.

This will be a mistake for a number of reasons and also seems to be product regulation, which we were led to believe they were not looking to do.

We have seen lenders reign in their credit policies over the last 12 months and only last week The Mortgage Works pulled out of the market.

During the last 18 months it has been compared with the “liar loan” from the USA but without any real understanding of the two different underwriting processes.

Read More »

It is evident from the comments made by Grant Shapps, shadow housing minister, that he has little time for the home information pack (Hip) in its current state, albeit he has little choice when it comes to the energy performance certificate given the European legislation.

I have some sympathy with him that, in its current state, the Hip adds little value to the process.

Read More »

The FSA have this week issued their long awaited policy statement on the liquidity regime and some positive developments have arisen.

Smaller full scope BIPRU firms, such as stockbrokers or broker dealers, will no longer be required to comply with the quantitative aspects of the regime, known as the Individual Liquidity Adequacy Standards.

Those coming under the FSA’s definition of ’smaller’ will be those with total assets less share capital, minority interests and reserves of less than £50m.

Read More »

I was pretty amazed, after watching snippets of the Great North Run a few of weeks ago, at how quick some of the competitors were running.

Some were doing over 13 miles in under 1 hour. With a record 54,000 people starting the Great North Run, it got me thinking about how there seems to have been an increase in people adopting fitness related hobbies recently.

Read More »

I recently read an item on FTAdviser.com in which an IFA complained he had been excluded from a list of qualified members published by the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII).

The report said “he was not a member of the CII but had received industry standard qualifications through the body and was concerned he would not be featured on this list because he is not a member of the institute despite having its qualifications.”

Now call me old fashioned, but I always thought that belonging to a professional body was one of the marks of a professional.

Read More »