financial advisor Archives - Innovative Advisory Group

Kirk Chisholm Ranks Top 100 On The Investopedia List of Most Influential Financial Advisors

Wall Street Wisdom / By Kirk Chisholm / 07/15/2022

I was recently notified that I was ranked #7 on the Investopedia list of Most Influential Financial Advisors. I am very grateful to receive this honor. It was somewhat unexpected. I have spent so much time trying to help investors that I have not stopped long enough to reflect on the impact I have made in the lives of my clients and social media connections. This award supports that all my efforts to educate investors and help them navigate the uncertain financial markets has not been in vain.

It means a lot to me to be recognized with such a notable group of financial advisors. Investing has always been a passion of mine. This passion started at a young age with small ventures such as a lemonade stand and lawn mowing services. In college, it continued with investing in the stock market. When I graduated, I got my first job at Paine Webber. Almost 10 years ago I co-founded Innovative Advisory Group. Investing and providing financial advice is in my blood.

As my knowledge of investing has grown, so has my desire to help others understand the mysteries of the financial markets. I hope to impart some of that wisdom to you in this post as well as other articles on this site.

Once again, I would like to thank Investopedia for this acknowledgment of my efforts. I also want to thank my clients and social media connections. I would not be where I am today without you.

Top 10 pieces of financial wisdom that can help you invest better

Investing is challenging, but it doesn’t have to be. It requires some extensive knowledge to become a highly successful investor in the stock market, but there are many ways to invest successfully. I will discuss some different ways to figure out how you can invest successfully below, however you will need to understand these simple concepts if you want to be successful long term.

How Fear and Greed Can Affect Your Investing

Wall Street Wisdom / By Kirk Chisholm / 02/15/2022

Financial Markets are driven by emotions: Fear and Greed

Master your investing emotions, or they will master you

The stock and bond markets are driven by four primary motivations. These four motivations are based on only 2 emotions, fear and greed. Investing is scary if you don’t know what you are doing. It is even scarier if you fully understand the risks through your own experience. Fear is a primal and instinctual emotion. Fear has kept our species from getting eaten by sabertooth tigers and jumping off cliffs trying to fly like a bird.

However when it comes to investing, that same primal instinct clouds the judgment of an otherwise rational educated person and causes him or her to make silly mistakes. In order to be successful as an investor, that fear has to be understood and harnessed in a productive way. I find fear to be the trickier of the two emotions because most people don’t understand how it applies to their own psychology.

Fear: The two fears of investing

The emotion of fear when investing can be broken down into 2 subcategories: Fear of losing money, and fear of under-performing the market (or more commonly known as, the fear of under-performing your friends).

Top 7 Financial Advisor Designations

Wall Street Wisdom / By Kirk Chisholm / 09/11/2019

“Mistakes are the best teachers. One does not learn from success. It is desirable to learn vicariously from other people’s failures, but it gets much more firmly seared in when they are your own.” – Mohnish Pabrai

This is the third post in a series of 3 about the financial advisor profession, financial advisor designations, and titles of financial advisors. The past two: Who is your financial advisor? and Top 8 titles used by financial advisors, discuss the different titles by which a financial advisor might be called. This post will detail 7 different financial advisor designations which require additional training and certification to use them. According to the Wall Street Journal, there are over 208 financial advisor designations^1. However many of them are relatively unknown to the majority of the financial advisor community and the investing public. Also a number of them are for specializations which many not apply for most of the advisor’s day-to-day activities.

I have chosen 7 designations: Certified Financial Planner, Chartered Financial Analyst, Chartered Financial Consultant, Certified Fund Specialist, Certified Investment Management Analyst, Chartered Market Technician, and Certified Public Accountant for this post. A number of these designation are common and well-known designations, but generally are not used by the financial advisory profession. Get to know these designations. If you meet someone with one of these designation, don’t be afraid to ask what they mean.

Top 8 Titles Used by Financial Advisors – Is Your Financial Advisor Registered?

Wall Street Wisdom / By Kirk Chisholm / 05/22/2019

This post is a continuation of the last post, Who is your Financial Advisor? In this post I will discuss some of the more common titles and licenses used in the finance-related profession. These are titles which professionals use to promote themselves. Some of these titles are given to them by their broker dealer, some are titles provided to them by obtaining a license and passing a test for proficiency, and some are self-designated.

Financial Advisors, their titles, and licenses

This is not an exhaustive list. There are many title professionals choose to call themselves. This post is only meant to discuss the more popular ones to help you navigate through all the terminology. Here is a list of the most common used titles for the finance-related profession:

Worried About Fraud with your Self Directed IRA? SEC says, Ask a Financial Advisor

Self Directed IRA / By Kirk Chisholm / 01/14/2015

In their September 2011 Investor Alert, Self Directed IRAs and the risk of fraud , the SEC outlined typical fraud risks when using a self directed IRA.

If you are worried about the risks of fraud when using a self directed IRA, then do as the SEC recommends in their Fraud Alert, “Ask a professional”.

The top three fraud risks with self directed IRAs that they focus on are:

Misrepresentations regarding custodial responsibilities
Exploitation of tax-deferred account characteristics
Lack of information for alternative investments

While these may be common fraud risks that the SEC sees with their enforcement efforts, the risks attributable to alternative investments inside self directed IRAs expand beyond just fraud risks. There are other risks which are important to consider when using a self directed IRA. Investors should also consider:

Who is Your Financial Advisor?

Wall Street Wisdom / By Kirk Chisholm / 11/30/2014

Professional titles are a great way to distinguish professionals from one another. You wouldn’t confuse Dr. John Smith with John Smith D.M.D., or Col. John Smith with Lt. John Smith. The financial advisory profession is much the same way. However it is a little more cryptic to the investing public as to what the different titles mean in the financial advisory profession due to their lack of uniformity. I hope to dispel some of this confusion right here.

Job “Title” vs Designation

Financial advisors use titles and designations to communicate to their clients and prospective clients who they are and what they do. While titles are a way to communicate to people what their role is, a designation is a way to show people that they have received additional education in certain areas. Unfortunately there is very little regulation or oversight in using different titles or designations from the industry regulators. This has actually been one of the main causes for the lack of clarity among the investing public along with the rampant creation of designations for different specializations. The Wall Street Journal recently listed 208 designations for financial service professionals on their website.¹

This list of 208 does not include designations which are internally given by companies to their brokers or advisors for passing an advanced education exam. For example, I received a Financial Planning Specialist (FPS) designation when I worked at Smith Barney. However, when I left the firm, I could no longer use the designation even though I passed the test. If you see the list, you will realize the runaway problem the financial services industry faces in further confusing the public. Some of these designations are monitored by FINRA and some are not.

How popular is your financial advisor?

As a professional financial advisor with over 15 years of experience, I have spent a lot of time over those years trying to craft the appropriate title to describe my profession, while at the same time trying to distinguish myself. One type of competition I have is with other people who have services which closely mirror my own. The other type of competition is from people who are from a different profession, but use the title of financial advisor. People from other professions who also use this title include: insurance salespeople, mortgage brokers, tax preparers, and more. This leads to a consumer who ends up being confused, and potentially does not get the help they are looking for.

Popular financial advisor designations

As an example of some of this research, I have illustrated the investing public’s levels of interest in the following four designations…

financial advisor