Best of BFM

Founder's Words

I would like to wish everyone lots of happiness and good health for the New Year!
 
Since many of you liked the first edition of the Best of BFM Newsletters in January 2012 (www.tinyurl.com/BFM-BestOf-I), we decided to create another one.
 
Many people are optimistic about 2015 (U.S. Markets up more than 200% since March 2009; up 11 of the last 12 calendar years…). While optimism is certainly in the air, it’s also more important than ever to diversify your investments.
 
That’s where our Best of BFM Newsletters II comes in. Over the past three years we’ve carefully assembled practical tips you can use to help you make better, more informed financial decisions.
 
At BFM, we want to sincerely thank all of our clients in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. Thank you for your loyal support and business throughout the past five years. We truly enjoy working with every single one of you.  Thank you for letting us be a small part of your life.

 

Introduction

I agree with Claude Rosenberg that investing money has never been a more demanding or sophisticated challenge. Wildly fluctuating markets, damaging conflicts of interest, compensation linked to commissions and account activity, lack of fiduciary duty, and a huge number of new investment products have dramatically changed the character of the investing game, and made the aid of a financial planner a necessity. At the same time, governments have failed to make sure advisers behave responsibly. Many possess little or no investment sophistication or credentials. The sad fact is that many times you can’t even believe the information you’ve received. You are left in the uncomfortable position of taking a salesperson's word to evaluate his or her firm's past record. Blind use of performance numbers can lead to erroneous conclusions and poor decisions. With higher taxes, higher costs of healthcare and education, higher market volatility, and higher employment risks, the demand for capital growth has led to greater need for reliable, independent and unbiased investment advice.

BFM, as a fiduciary which always acts in your best interest, offers you peace of mind and investment strategies. We are your personal CFO and help you properly analyze some of the promotional tactics used-and abused-by investment managers so that you are less likely of being misled. We have no claims that we will enable you to make money easily, but we will give you numerous practical, profit-oriented tips, and a wealth of helpful guidelines to help you reach your personalized goals as well as a comfortable retirement.

Managing the accounts for a total of more than $2 billion qualifies me to guide you through this investment jungle. Our goal is to show you how to avoid some common pitfalls that threaten you, and to provide you with the practical steps you can take to improve your own investment results. A mutual fund that is superior for someone else may not be the fund that is superior for you!

The knowledge we give you about investing cycles and styles, about fighting herd instincts, about the emotional side of investing, about developing sensitivities and certain protections against people who sell investment "products" should prove valuable in all types of decisions. One important way to mitigate surprise is to understand before investing how you are likely to react to the very human but inhibiting reactions of fear, envy, greed, anger, worry, and remorse. After all, one obstacle to clients' success is often the client himself!

To start the New Year, we offer you a summary of some of our past newsletters over the past three years.

As always, we thank you for your support and welcome your comments. 

               

        

 

   

                            

                                                       

 

                                          

                     
Thanks for your wisdom and for creating the first index mutual fund available to the general public! Jack Bogle is the founder and retired CEO of The Vanguard Group and one of the greatest investors. I agree with Jack's approach to investing defined by simplicity and common sense.

                                         

« Thinking Fast and Slow » from Dr. Daniel Kahneman is one of the best books I have ever read on cognitive psychology, decision-making, and behavioral economics. Dr. Kahneman has never taken a single economics course but he received the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics in 2002!

                               

     

                                                            

 

                                                      

 

  

   

                        

                                                                                  

        

 

                                          

                     

    

                                                   

                                                                                               

                                                                                                                                                                               


                        
                         

 

We would welcome the opportunity to know you better, introduce ourselves, share with you the work we do for our clients, and position ourselves as a useful resource for you. It would be a wise first step towards achieving your vision.

 

Getting to know you, your needs and motivations, is almost as important as you evaluating our capabilities to help you meet your financial goals. We do not charge a fee for our initial consultation during which we review your portfolio, and listen to your goals and objectives.

                                         

 

What type of clients do we have? Our clients are located across the globe including North America, Europe and Asia. We have an unbiased approach in selecting our clientele i.e. our client base is broad encompassing expatriates, executives, entrepreneurs, working professionals, and business individuals. We welcome all clients from individuals with wealthy multi-million dollar portfolios to individuals who currently have negative net worth. 

We have no portfolio size minimums.

Learn more about our straightforward flat fee conflict-free compensation model.

 

We have discovered that one of the most valuable things we do for our clients is guiding them on selecting better mutual funds and making sure they have enough assets as long as they live. If you have any ideas on how we should connect with people in such situations, your advice would be a great help.

 

 

 

This newsletter was first published in January of 2015

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