Jasmine's Thought Box

2009-10-29T23:49:00.000-07:00

51 Percent at Risk of Struggling in Retirement
By Money Management Executive
October 29, 2009

The percentage of Americans at risk of having to cope with lower living standards in retirement has risen to 51%, seven percentage points higher than the 44% last measured in 2007, the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College found. And the figures would be even higher if they accounted for healthcare and long-term care, the center said.

Among low-income households, the percentage at risk is 60%, among middle-income it is 47%, and for high-income it is 42%.

And Nationwide Mutual Insurance, which underwrote the research for the National Retirement Risk Index, has found that many investors are becoming disengaged about planning for retirement. Twenty-five percent fewer people say they would seek advice before making investment decisions, and 60% less agree that retirement income is important.

“We are clearly facing a retirement crisis, one that will continue to grow as younger workers age,” said center Director Alicia H. Munnell. Both the center and Nationwide are calling on investors and their advisers to proactively prepare for retirement, particularly for advisers to empathize with their clients’ frustration and cynicism. Specifically, the organizations recommend that people save and invest more, reduce debt and work longer.

Source: http://www.financial-planning.com/news/51-percent-risk-struggling-in-retirement-2664342-1.html?ET=financialplanning:e876:2120256a:&st=email

Most people in their youth, would have left retirement planning at the back of their minds. Its something to be done; just not right now. There's always something holding us back.

"Its such a hassle!"
"No money..."
"No time..."
"I can't be bothered."
"There's still a lot of time before I retire!"

As with most financial matters, when we decide its time, it might be too late. By that time, retirement planning might become painful. When we start early, we plan a little at a time. Thing minimizes abrupt changes to your cash flow, lifestyle and spending patterns.

The key to a comfortable retirement is to 1st determine how much you might require at old age, taking into account inflation, personal preference and rising cost of living. Working backwards from there, determine how much you can put aside monthly by analyzing your cash flow and spending habits. There after, its time to find avenues to grow your money in manners that accrue to your risk appetite and character.

Start planning early to avoid being unable to retire comfortably at an age that you want to! =)

AIA Wealth Accumulator

2009-08-09T21:01:00.000-07:00

AIA's new product, the Wealth Accumulator is being snapped up like hot cakes! It is indeed an attractive product.. Find out about it here: http://jasminetxy-newproducts.blogspot.com/

2009-06-29T19:33:00.000-07:00

Fidelity Study: Millionaires Better Off with Advisors
By Helen Kearney
June 29, 2009

Millionaires with financial advisors have lost less money during the financial crisis than those who don’t work with an advisor, according to a new study by Fidelity Investments.

The study surveyed 1,000 households with at least $1 million in investable assets in February 2009. It found that millionaires who work with an advisor lost an average of 4% of their assets during 2008. Meanwhile, millionaires who didn’t work with an advisor saw an average decline of 18% of their assets.

And these millionaire clients credited their advisors’ work. Seventy-six percent of respondents who use an advisor acknowledged that their advisors helped to limit their losses. Also, 85% of those clients stayed with their advisors during the crisis, while one in ten stopped working with an advisor altogether.

Unsurprisingly, millionaire clients said they wanted to communicate more often with their advisors during this time. Twenty-nine percent of respondents with advisors said they preferred to communicate with them at least once a week, up from 20% last year.

“With investors’ appetite for more support, broker/dealers and advisors may be challenged to find the time and resources,” said Gail Graham, executive vice president of Fidelity Investments, in a statement. “They will need to look for ways to enhance operational efficiencies to devote more time to keeping in touch with clients.”

Source: http://www.bankinvestmentconsultant.com/news/fidelity-study-millionaires-advisors-2663107-1.html?ET=bankic:e470:2120256a:&st=email

I love this article! Its nice to know that my fellow advisors are being appreciated! When the going gets tough, I realise that its job satisfaction that keeps us going. (Or at least, keeps me going.) =)

Fund Raising Activity

2009-06-16T23:32:00.001-07:00

A friend sent me this email today with a blog address attached to it. Its about a single mom with a child with cancer. These emails are a dime a dozen. Some of them are scams. However, since this friend says that this single mom is an ex-colleague of her friend and therefore she doesn't doubt the authenticity of this blog, I decided to read on.

Halfway through reading the blog, I teared and I really couldn't continue reading. As the little girl's mummy is blogging, I believe she must be so heartbroken. There are so many children born every second; any baby / toddler can be the one aflicted by child illnesses / diseases. Why her?

I don't know whether this is a scam (don't think so and hopefully not) but this email reminded me of something important.

In my course of work, I know of the importance of getting coverage for children. But I've always thought that it isn't the most important for a child. I've always felt that medical coverage for children is good to have but education planning is more important. But now that I've read this, I realise how wrong I am. What can be more important than health? Who dictates that children cannot fall sick? Who says that only old people get diseases? Without money for medical treatment to save the child's life, what is the use of education planning? I hope that none of you reading this would think that my agenda of this post is purely to push insurance sales. That is clearly not the point. The point is, when was the last time you helped someone in need? I asked myself this and I was shocked. The last time for me was yesterday when I gave up my seat to an old lady on the bus but compared to this, its nothing.

I've never believed in monetary donation because I can't trace where the money goes to. (I don't want it to end up funding someone's golden tap) But then again, the last time I volunteered was.. a long time ago.

As we sit healthily complaining about life, maybe we should take a moment or two to smile and think of how lucky we are. We are healthy, educated, living above the poverty line (UN defines poor as living below USD$2 a day), have a roof over our head, have proper clothes to wear, need not worry about our 3 meals, have access to clean water, electricity and *ahem* air con (thank goodness! =p) we should really feel happy and blessed. Most importantly, lets try to help others as much as we can; monetary or otherwise. As long as it helped someone's life a tad better, no matter the extent of the impact, its good enough.. =)

I've decided to organise a fund raising activity for them, not just in cold hard cash but also in terms of donating gifts that are still new but you may have no use for them as well as donating books. They will sell these items for cash.

Other ways u can help:

Buying Hand-made Accessories
Buying Home-made Cheese Cake/Muffins/Quiche For Sale
Donate A Gift
Donate A Used Watch
Donate A Book

If any of you are interested to help or have stuff to donate I'll be more than happy to collect them at your doorstep to collate everyone's donation to pass to them. If you'll like to order accessories or cakes from them I believe you can get in touch with them at their website. Alternatively you can let me know and I'll try to get more orders and lias w them.. Anything that you can donate would be very helpful. Plush toys, mugs, photo frames, books, etc... They don't cost you a cent yet would mean a lot to this family.

Even though I do not think that this is a scam, I've decided to contact the family to verify whether it is a real case. If so, the fund raising activity continues. If otherwise, I will return every single piece of donated items I've collected to the donors.

Please help.

Excerpt from http://ourfeistyprincess.blogspot.com/:

Everytime she visit NUH for a blood test, she knows that she will be getting her finger pricked. So our cheeky princess will choose which finger before getting poked. Today was no exception.

Me: "Charmaine, so which finger the nurse prick today?"
Char: "Pointer. Mummy, this is left or right?"
Cyn: "Right"
Char: "Right pointer finger"
Me: "So did you cry and scream today?"
Char: "I shout very loud but no water come out leh"

Adorable cutie that continues to cheer us up in our gloomy workplace.

- Posted by Charlene

Please visit their website:

http://www.ourfeistyprincess.com/index.php

http://ourfeistyprincess.blogspot.com/

Tie up with AIA!

2009-05-26T01:16:00.000-07:00

Great neWs!! Financial Alliance has tied up with AIA to provide even more products to our clients. The products available to our clients are as shown below:

AIA Prestige Term Series 5/10/20 years
AIA Platinum Life
AIA Platinum Rewards
AIA Platinum Legacy
AIA Platinum Legacy Preserver
AIA HealthShield Gold Elite / Essential
AIA Pink of Health
AIA Achiever Protector
AIA Achiever Accumulator
AIA Gen 3

Just by looking at the list shown, I bet a few of them can give Manulife a good competition. AIA's Pink of Health is also a good product that I like. Slightly on the expensive side yes. But definately a good product.

We would be able to start looking at AIA's products from 11th June 2009 onwards :)
One little step for us, one leap of benefits for all our clients. Yippie! =D

2009-05-10T07:22:00.000-07:00

Work-wise, last week wasn't too smooth sailing for me. However, a call from a client last night totally made my week. He called twice and I thought what was so urgent. Once I picked up the call, he excitedly told me he just checked his portfolio of unit trusts we put together and in 2 month's time he had a 32% profit =D I was so happy for him! I guess this is where the sense of achievement in my job comes in! :)

Swine Flu's impact on the Economy

2009-04-29T09:09:00.000-07:00

"The recent outbreak of swine flu is something analyst calls a potential
"low probability, high impact" event, with many fearing that it will lead to
a pandemic with catastrophic consequences. From an investment perspective,
the appearance of swine flu comes at a time when markets have just shown
signs of stabilizing and recovering.
Will this signal the end to the recovery and will markets now resume their
downtrend?

Or will this represent the best buying opportunity especially for those who
had missed the recent rally?"

Victor and Sani would be giving an overview of the situation, focus on how
the swine flu could potentially impact financial markets as we draw
parallels from the previous

SARS experience and other major viral breakout occurrences, and how we
believe investors should position themselves in the present situation.

Date: 5th May 2009

Venue: Financial Alliance Training Room

Time: 7:30 to 8:30pm

~Light refreshments would be provided at 7pm.

Interested parties do email me so I can help youi register before the dateline :)
jasminetoh@fa.com.sg / jasminetoh0210@gmail.com

2009-04-21T21:15:00.000-07:00

Been busy the whole of last week with a roadshow at IMM. The main aim of the roadshow was to let more people know about IFA firms like ours. I was there for 5 out of the 7 days we were scheduled to be there. It was a great experience as it was my first time doing a 'mall-styled' roadshow. I had the opportunity to meet all sorts of people!

Initially it did feel really tiring but as I started talking to more shoppers it got increasingly interesting. Of course there were people who totally ignored my attempts to introduce myself but that is expected. Afterall, I am a stranger to them and in their point of view, I must be trying to sell them something. Haha.. After a while, I decided to open the conversation by saying, "I'm not trying to sell you anything.." haha.. in all, it was an interesting experience :)

Cuddly teddy from Aberdeen

2009-03-31T22:06:00.000-07:00

I've attended their seminars before and of course they've spoken during company meetings too. This seminar will be informative and useful to people who would like to invest and also people who would like to know more about the current investment climate. If you are interested to attend just drop me a sms or an email and I'll do the registration for you! :) Do click on the picture to enlarge it to read about the background of the speakers. Clients of mine who have attended the previous session were pretty impressed. Do join us! :)

Bad Encounter with Q

2009-03-27T01:44:00.000-07:00

Had a really bad encounter today. =(

1month ago, Q asked me for help. His motor insurance has expired for 2 weeks (1month ago) and he couldn't find an insurer willing to insure his vehicle. The only insurer willing to take him quoted him near to a 5 figure amount! Q's financial situation isn't too rosy but his vehicle urgently needed insurance! I sensed the urgency of the situation and immediately got down to work. I emailed and called numerous insurers and attempted to generate quotations online myself. All but one rejected this case. From those who rejected, I tried to negociate with them close to the point of pleading with them to take him. What's going to happen to him if he can't afford to buymotor insurance? He can't sell his car because he'll need to fork out much more money! Finally an insurer was willing to insure him. I negociated and they gave me a lower quote than initially offered. Excitedly, I tried contacting him but he was overseas. The quotation was only valid for 7 days so I knew my effort had partly gone to waste; but never mind that. All for the interest of the client; I told myself.

I waited for Q to come back but he told me he is looking for alternatives such as refinancing and I was told to wait. So I did. Then, he suggested to insure the vehicle under his brother's name. So again, I tried contacting various insurers. Met with rebuff still! But eventually I found an insurer at a pretty attractive rate! Very excitedly I contacted Q only to be told he ALREADY signed for insurance with another company at a thousand dollars more than what I can offer him mere hours ago! I asked whether he might want to consider stoping the deduction and consider my offer since he mentioned his priority is on low cost but he did not reply me.

If Q had found a cheaper alternative (which meets his main objective), I would be happy for him. But here is a plan that suits his criteria more yet he isn't taking it up! I am totally baffled. On reflection, I think that I cared about his financial welfare more than he cared for his own. If he had wanted more expensive alternatives I could have used less effort and even earned more (I earn a single digit percentage of the premiums) but I didn't! I considered all options for him and went to great lengths to secure a deal that would benefit him yet there wasn't even a word of thanks.

Thankfully not all clients are like him. I have clients sending me thank you cards, telling me I make a great advisor because I listen and I sincerely care. I guess its these encouragements that keep me going. On bad days like this, I fall back on their cards, their encouragement and I get back on my feet again. It will take more than this to get rid of me in the financial advisory business. For the sake of my existing clients, I work even harder! All the way!!! =)

2009-03-22T01:00:00.001-07:00

Dear friends and valued clients, 22nd March 2009 marks the setting up of this blog. In this blog, I will be sharing financial articles, testimonials from clients, new interesting product launches and my thoughts and experiences along my career as a financial adviser of an independent financial advisory firm.

Hopefully readers would find the regular update of financial articles useful and informative. I hope to keep improving myself through testimonials from clients.

If I may, I would like to think of my job not just as an adviser financially, even though that might be my expertise. I would like to touch the lives of all my clients and friends in one way or another. This, will not be my job. It will be my career. =)