There is a funny thing that happens at very large investment management firms: they ask to invest all of your money on your behalf in exchange for a market-fee, and they will "throw in" some financial services.
Financial services is a broad moniker that describes a number of things crucial to a high-net-worth individual:
estate planning
income tax planning
wealth planning - i.e. cashflow optimization
business bookkeeping
banking, wires, bill pay
investment sourcing and diligence
loan placement
insurance
trust services
Over time, the financial landscape morphed to bundle all of these services together and sell them all under the title of "financial advisory."
A thoughtful person may ask: why are you giving away such valuable items "for free"?
Theoretically, great tax planning and insurance optimization can be worth hundreds of basis points per year. Trust and estate attorneys and top accounting firms bill top dollar.
Why is my "small" fee, ostensibly for asset management, itself an expensive and valuable service, covering these services?
I heard a great podcast recently which made this point very well:
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They used a great metaphor: if I go to get an oil change, and they throw in a free tire rotation and windshield wipers, I start to question if the oil change is any good at all?
I would add, it goes without saying that the windshield wipers are likely not of top quality.
This reminds me of banks that gave away small appliances and cookware when you opened an account.
Welcome to the age of unbundling financial services.
As a rule, modern consumers do not like being sold, they prefer to buy. They are sophisticated enough to do their own research and discover the best products available.
Great asset managers deserve the entire fee that they earn. So do tax planners, wealth planners and insurance experts and all of the other professionals at the top of their fields.
Those fees need not be exorbitant, but they also need not be related in any way to the assets under management of another professional.
That creates inherent conflicts of interest, where the manager is incentivized to find low-cost services to throw in to make it seem like the asset management fee is a bargain. This also leads to opacity of where your fees are going, since someone needs to pay those attorneys (etc.) that work for the investment manager "for free".
Today, people want to know exactly what they are buying and of what quality.
There is a paradigm shift underway where people are beginning to realize the value of these services, and why they should be bought, not sold.
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