Compliance

The rule could "very much professionalize an industry that very much needs it," says Robert Johnson, president of the planning school.

Advisors can get a helpful best-practices checklist, which may also help build client relationships, from the Institute for the Fiduciary Standard.

Voices: an advisor earning a high single-figure commission from a variable annuity product should become a thing of the past.

The decision could put the spotlight on firms like Citadel, Millennium Management, D.E. Shaw and Bridgewater, which oversee a combined $654 billion in assets, according to SEC filings.

Bonnie Baha, the global developed credit director at DoubleLine, discusses several challenges facing fixed income.

The broker was reprimanded for lying on a customer's behalf.

Michael Donnelly was sentenced for defrauding elderly clients of about $2 million, which he used to make car payments, pay his children's private school tuition and other expenses.

BlackRock made its $152 million deal for the Silicon Valley-based startup FutureAdvisor last August. Since then, its robo advice client roster has expanded.

A number of advisors are striving for the status quo instead of creating a better business and stronger relationships. In effect, they're giving up.

Parthemer worked with pro athletes and frequented South Beach clubs with rap stars.

Richard Ketchum, former critic of the rule, calls the final version "much better" than the earlier proposal. But he still wants to see the SEC develop a uniform standard.

Advisors should be “prepared to defend their recommendations,” the low-cost planning pioneer says, and predicts the demise of high-fee products.

Voices: The DoL is restricting investor choice and casts an unnecessarily critical light on existing B-D relationships that only follow a suitability requirement.

Chairwoman Mary Jo White tells lawmakers that a uniform standard for advisors and broker-dealers remains a priority, but that says it's a long slog.

Voices: If clients are already comfortable with DIY-investing, they could have already done so themselves with a robo advisor or low-cost brokerage.

"I think it’s too soon to call this version anything close to a victory for either consumers or the financial services industry," writes John Taft, CEO of RBC Wealth Management.

Announcing this year's winners of Money Management Executive's Top Women in Asset Management Awards.

Fiduciary advocates argue that the compliance burden from the best-interest contract exemption and other new provisions will be modest and won't materially affect how they serve clients.

The low-cost, passive trend may be accelerated because of new fiduciary rules issued by the Department of Labor.

An advisor’s omission leads to a big reward for a client.