Practice management

51% of American adults would switch advisors or begin working with one for the first time if provided with a written retirement income strategy for them.

Claiming the next generation of clients and standing out from the crowd are very much on advisors’ minds, but they’re still grappling with how to deal with those two critical issues.

FINRA has censured Securities America and fined it $100,000 for making inaccurate and misleading statements to clients via emails.

In order for advisors to stand their ground to direct providers like Fidelity, Schwab and ETrade, they must not lose sight of younger and low to middle market investors, says Bing Waldert, director at Cerulli Associates.

RIAs love the flexibility of running their own business, but, when your bedroom becomes your office, it becomes difficult to keep a schedule. Dave Grant says he loves the flexibility of being self-employed, but internally he's screaming for a schedule. Check out some of his ideas and offer him some ideas that have worked for you.

Following a bearish May, investor confidence shot up in June, according to the State Street Global Investor Confidence Index released Tuesday.

More than one in four Baby Boomers and Gen Xers who otherwise would have had adequate retirement income are projected to run out of money if rates remain as they are.

Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ) won dismissal of a lawsuit filed by pension plan beneficiaries challenging the company’s decision to shed $7.4 billion in obligations by buying a single-premium group annuity.

Some hedge-fund managers recently came under pressure from the American Federation of Teachers to quit the boards of certain organizations, such as Students First and the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, that favor the elimination of public-sector defined-benefit pension plans.

“It's a pretty big issue for us,” said Daniel Sibears, FINRA executive vice president for member regulation. “There are many dozens of complaints where there's been [a] compromise of customer information, particularly information that is needed to get into online accounts and to execute transactions and move money.”

Investors remain wary of the financial sector, which is bad news for advisors. But by examining the best practices of successful advisors, we can all learn valuable lessons about how to strengthen trust and build greater public confidence.

Thirty eight percent of fund firms across the country said that they will increase technology-related costs while a total of 17% of respondents said they expected no change in whether their firm's technology costs would rise or decline for the rest of this year.

Women are a growing economic force. They currently control the majority of wealth in the U.S. and are estimated to receive approximately 70% of the $41 trillion in intergenerational wealth transfers over the next several decades. It makes good business sense to learn how to attract and retain these economically powerful female clients.

Seeking a better way to share documents with wealthy clients, Exemplar Financial Network chose a Dropbox-like service with client-side encryption.

Government policy is becoming a more prominent topic of conversation between financial advisors and their clients, according to a recent study as well as anecdotal reports -- and remarks by the Federal Reserve chairman last week on the future of the Fed’s stimulus policy have spurred even more discussions about government policy.

Thanks to video conferencing, RIAs have a much broader array of hiring options to consider.

Citi's social media guru Frank Eliason offers insights into how to pick social media partners, while consultants and lawyers share what's needed in any vendor relationship.

Women in the United States account for about 47% of the workforce, compared to roughly 29.6% in 1950, according to data from the U.S. Labor Force. No doubt about it, female influence in the workforce is growing. Yet, the gender divide among advisors at the some of the largest firms is pretty striking.

Financial advisors are concentrating too much of their resources on baby boomers and not enough on the next generation of clients, suggests a new report from Cerulli Associates.

Two U.S. Senate aides nominated to join the Securities and Exchange Commission will get a confirmation hearing before the Senate Banking Committee on June 27, according to a Senate announcement today.