Graham Rich

Portfolio Construction Forum is drafting a submission, to be delivered to the Financial Adviser Standards and Ethics Authority (FASEA) as part of the consultation process on new continuing professional development (CPD) standards.

The Forum’s submission will set out its significant concerns about the robustness of the proposed CPD regime, and recommend relevant and meaningful alternatives.

The Forum encourages its members, and other interested parties, to read the FASEA proposals and similarly engage with the FASEA CPD consultation process, or to contact the Forum for assistance, prior to the 31 August 2018 consultation deadline.

“The proposed CPD regime falls well short of any reasonable community expectations of FASEA and what drove its formation, and fails to lift the educational standards required of an emerging profession,” said Graham Rich, Managing Partner and Dean at Portfolio Construction Forum.

“If the objective of FASEA is to lift trust and confidence in financial advice, and raise professionalism, then financial adviser CPD activity is obviously a critical piece of the solution. As the FASEA proposal stands at the moment, it will not achieve this pathway. In my view, the proposed CPD regime only addresses the ‘continuing’ aspect of CPD, but ignores the crucial ‘professional’ and ‘development’ elements – as such, it is only doing at best one-third of the job. The proposals fail at every level to show how they will lift CPD standards and outcomes, and meet community expectations” said Rich. “This shows a lack of understanding of core issues, and simply fiddles.”

Portfolio Construction Forum will submit feedback to FASEA in its role as the specialist, independent, investment continuing education and certification service curated for Australia’s and NZ’s investment portfolio construction practitioners.

“Obviously the Forum is actively engaged in providing a range of investment continuing education programs. Although the FASEA proposal would likely be commercially advantageous to us, we don’t believe that it’s in the best interests of professionalism, and so oppose the present suggestions” said Rich.

The post Portfolio Construction Forum: FASEA Proposals fail to address the ‘P’ and ‘D’ of CPD appeared first on AdviserVoice.

Shaun Weston-Cole

The Financial Planning Association of Australia (FPA) has exempted Certified Investment Management Analyst® (CIMA®) certificants from a core component of the Certified Financial Planner® (CFP®) program.

The exemption offers Australian CIMA certificants an accelerated path to CFP certification, and supports growing recognition of CIMA certification as the peak international, technical portfolio construction certification program, for investment and wealth management practitioners and advocates.

Following an independent assessment of the CIMA program, the FPA has awarded “advanced standing” status to CIMA certificants for the CFP 4: Investment Strategies unit. CFP 4 focuses on the development of investment strategies in accordance with the personal circumstances of clients, and constitutes one of four modules which non-exempt CFP candidates must complete, prior to final assessment. Exemption from CFP 4 will be granted to CIMA certificants who meet the entry requirements for CFP, and who request advanced standing when they enrol in the CFP program.

Advanced standing for CFP 4 brings several benefits, allowing exempted CFP candidates to save an estimated 120 hours of study time, and reducing course fees by as much as A$1,550 (based on the charging structure for 2017).

The exemption additionally provides independent confirmation that CIMA certification meets level nine of the government-managed Australian Qualifications Framework, and that CIMA designees have therefore completed a master’s degree-level educational program.

“The FPA’s decision is a welcome recognition of the high educational standards of the CIMA program,” said Graham Rich, managing partner and dean of PortfolioConstruction Forum, which manages and delivers the CIMA program in Australia. “Advanced standing is good news for CIMA certificants who want to use their investment skill and knowledge as a financial planner, and for certificants who work in business development and who wish to gain a greater understanding of the financial planning role.”

Shaun Weston-Cole, head of education at the FPA, said: “The FPA welcomes the addition of the Certified Investment Management Analyst (CIMA) certification to the list of quality education providers approved for advanced standing for the CFP 4 unit of the CFP Certification Program.”

The post CIMA Certificants on a fast track to CFP certification appeared first on AdviserVoice.

Jenny Brown

I’d love to see you and welcome you to fascinating Canberra, our nation’s capital for the AFA 2016 National Adviser Conference, the jewel in the crown for the AFA – October 5-7, 2016.

As a practising adviser, this Conference is always the highlight of my year and I look forward to it as a chance to hear, watch and learn from the best, as well as to catch up with colleagues and friends.

This year’s conference is about ‘Adaptive Change – taking advice beyond the horizon’ and as advisers we need to accept the challenge to think differently, to evolve and to be better prepared for the opportunities and challenges that lie ahead.

The AFA has been working tirelessly to be more effective in delivering value for members by improving the positioning and relevance of our association, the results of which will be on show at the conference – whether it has been raising adviser professionalism, stronger relationships and influence with Government, an industry-leading professional education pathway, or the building of a voice to consumers through Your Best Interests – the AFA has laid a strong platform for the future.

As preparations for the 2016 AFA National Adviser Conference approach the final stages, we are absolutely thrilled to be able to bring some amazing keynote speakers to the stage including;

• The Hon John Howard OA AC – Political Leadership
• Dr Ric Charlesworth – High-Performance Leadership
• Dr Adam Fraser – Peak Performance Without the Collateral Damage
• Tony Bongiorno – MDRT Learnings from Around the World
• Dr Jason Mitchell – Academic Leadership
• Brian Freeman – Humanitarian Leadership
• Dr Jason Mitchell, Professor of Psychology Harvard University
• Graham Rich, PortfolioConstruction Forum
• Stephen Halmarick, Chief Economist CFS Global Asset Management
• Joanne Earl, Associate Professor Flinders Business School
• David Reed, Adviser of the Year
• Paul Kearney, Practice of the Year
• Over 30 AFA Members sharing their best practice
• Brad Fox, Scott Moffit, Richard Klipin, Terry Rhodes, Dave Slovinec – Growing the demand for insurance

We have 3 amazing masterclasses from our communities of practice to explore more opportunities;

• Inspire with Margie Warrell
• Genxt with Dr Ric Charlesworth
• Leaders Forum – The AFA community of ideas and sharing

These world class speakers are augmented by a plethora of awesome advisers from our AFA community who are all willing to share the insights, skills and knowledge that they have applied to their own advice practices to ensure they are future proofed and ready to thrive as financial advice is taken beyond the horizon.

The conference committee has listened to members’ feedback and worked hard to build a program that blends exceptional technical knowledge with practical implementation based upon the AFA adviser learning pillars:

• Business Performance
• Adviser Performance
• Advice Strategies
• Professionalism and Learning

Our goal is to provide you with inspiration and load you up with the best ideas, strategies and the tools to implement those ideas to ensure that you can deliver exceptional service for your clients, helping them understand your advice strategies and how you can work with them to build and lead better lives. After all, everything we do is to put our clients and their families into a better situation, to be their trusted adviser.

Also, back by popular demand are our ‘Meet the Professionals’ and ‘Meet the Innovators’ round-table discussions.

With more advisers than ever now choosing to belong to the AFA, we are proud that there is more adviser input to this year’s conference agenda. Hearing from our peers we have always found to be incredibly worthwhile, and remembering that the smartest person in the room may not be the person on stage, it could be the person sitting next to you, or at lunch, or at the dinner function, you will hear a multitude of stories or how advisers solve our client’s problems, how they refine their skills, and we can even learn from their mistakes. Advisers have a unique perspective on the operation of the financial advice profession and all of this knowledge and ongoing learning can be captured and shared for the benefit of all.

So my question to you is, “What is holding you back from taking the next step forward in how you provide advice, how you improve your client experience and client outcomes, and your own profitability?” My bet is the answers can be found at the AFA National Adviser Conference.

But have you booked yet? The answers won’t come to you; you need to come to Conference to get them. In the absence of taking action, nothing will change, so click on to www.afaconference.com.au and register.

Whether you are a new adviser, a practice owner or an employed adviser, this will be a conference to help equip you to serve your client’s needs better, to prepare you for the opportunities ahead and help you take your financial advice beyond the horizon.

We’re looking forward to seeing you in Canberra.

Jenny Brown, Conference Co-Chair

The post Are you ready to take your advice practice beyond the horizon? appeared first on AdviserVoice.

Graham Rich

Capital Preferences, a leading global financial technology company founded in the United States, has entered into the Australian market and formed a strategic partnership with PortfolioConstruction Forum, naming it the official accreditation provider for a new training program.

Called Quantitative Advice Methods, the program is aimed at financial advisers serving the New Zealand and Australian private banking, superannuation and retail markets, and will focus on the application of game theory and econometrics to client profiling and portfolio construction.

As part of the agreement, Capital Preferences’ customers in NZ and Australia will have the opportunity to enroll their front line staff in an accreditation program overseen and managed by PortfolioConstruction Forum.

“Capital Preferences’ academic faculty are innovative thought leaders who bring something entirely new to the understanding of a consumer’s risk, time and social preferences and how to customise client portfolios with this data,” says Graham Rich, founder and director of PortfolioConstruction Forum.

“I believe they will see great success in our sophisticated and client-focused community. Ours is a market that desperately needs innovation and new thinking like theirs.”

Bernard Del Rey, CEO and Co-Founder of Capital Preferences says: “Portfolio Construction Forum is the ideal accreditation partner to share our firm’s research and methods.

“Graham has built a community where the most forward looking and disciplined professionals gather to practice their craft. We represent the next generation of enterprise consumer profiling and product recommendation tools and our focus on robustly tested methods originating from the top levels of academia and science is shared by PortfolioConstruction Forum members.

“We respect PCF members for the way they apply their skills and look forward to bringing them and their clients breakthrough tools.”

As part of the relationship PortfolioConstruction Forum will feature general content from Capital Preferences’ and make it available to all of its members. Pre-qualified advisors, who are members of either FPA or Certified Financial Planners are eligible for accreditation in the Quantitative Advice Methods program and can receive discounted individual subscriptions to the firm’s advanced technology, beginning with the 15 April 2016 release of the firm’s Australian product line. The training program will include deep exposure to the research and methods developed by Shachar Kariv, Chief Scientist, Co-Founder and Chair of the Economics Department at University of California Berkeley.

The relationship launched yesterday with a talk by Daniel Silverman, Senior Research Advisor for Capital Preferences and Professor of Economics at Arizona State University.

The post New alliance supports education of advisers in Australia and New Zealand appeared first on AdviserVoice.

PortfolioConstruction to create CPD for AFA members.

The Association of Financial Advisers (AFA) has once again demonstrated its ongoing commitment to enhancing the AFA’s continuing professional development (CPD) program with the appointment of PortfolioConstruction Forum to create and deliver a far-reaching investment and portfolio construction curriculum (the curriculum).

AFA CEO Brad Fox said, “The AFA’s new relationship with PortfolioConstruction Forum reaffirms the AFA’s commitment to delivering a balanced professional development program for our members and a consistent and cohesive investment narrative across all our programs.”

Graham Rich, Publisher of PortfolioConstruction Forum, presented the vision for the curriculum at the AFA’s National Roadshow this month. The Roadshow was a sell-out across five capital cities around Australia.

“The AFA and PortfolioConstruction Forum share the belief that the higher purpose of financial advice is to ensure that the wealth of every Australian is not only protected but, as a result of quality investment advice, maximized so that they can live the life they want to live in retirement,” Mr Fox said.

Deepening the AFA’s education curriculum in investment and portfolio construction will also help further build consumer trust in the financial advice profession, Mr Fox said.

“The AFA is committed to providing members with access to the continuing professional development they need to build, manage and protect the wealth of every day Australians,” he said. “We are delighted that a provider of the caliber of PortfolioConstruction Forum is joining us on this journey and look forward to them moderating the investment content at the AFA National Conference in October and beyond.”

PortfolioConstruction Forum is recognised as Australia’s leading investment and portfolio construction continuing professional development provider for financial advisers/planners in Australia.

The AFA has long had a reputation for working co-operatively and collaboratively with industry experts to deliver best practice solutions for its members.

Click here to o find out more about PortfolioConstruction Forum.

The post AFA Partners With PortfolioConstruction Forum appeared first on AdviserVoice.