Wealth ManagementInvestment Advice

The role of your financial adviser in navigating volatile markets

24 June 2021
3 min read

24 June 2021

COVID-19 continues to interrupt our daily lives, creating financial uncertainty for clients and markets alike. And during uncertain times, the role of your financial adviser should be to guide you through the complexity, helping you avoid emotional or poor decisions and, when opportunity presents itself, giving you the confidence to act.

Contrary to some schools of thought, while financial advisers specialise and understand markets deeply and need to explain the reasons for market movements using clear and understandable language, they are not necessarily the best placed people to be commenting on market fluctuations. Between meeting client obligations such as review meeting schedules and client communications, and implementing the agreed strategic advice, there isn’t a lot of time left to study markets and investment movements.

Think about your medical situation as an example. You seek advice from your local General Practitioner for general medical concerns and, if you need medical advice outside of their scope, your GP will refer you to specialists. Financial planning is much the same. Your financial planner acts as the GP who refers you to experts who can provide specialised advice in areas such as investments, insurance or SMSFs.

So, just who are these investment specialists? For Findex, they’re a team of specialists that assist in portfolio design and management and include respected organisations such as State Street Global Advisers, Dalton, Nichol, Reid (DNR) and Freehold Investment Management – each with their own area of expertise.

The advice provided by these organisations combined with the governance process undertaken by Findex, is designed to evaluate what actions should be considered and adopted for portfolios. It is these actions that can help to create return outperformance in volatile markets and underpin quality risk management decisions.

What is unique about Findex’s governance process is the inclusion of independent members who can veto any recommendation adopted by our management and adviser members but not replace them. This, along with a dedicated Client Advocate on our investment committee to represent the interests of clients, helps provide greater confidence that the actions undertaken are in the clients’ best interest.

The role of your financial adviser is to help ensure any investment and strategic advice you receive, such as retirement planning, risk profiling or wealth accumulation, are in your best interest. Findex takes pride in being a financial services company that supports their advisers with the expertise of investment specialists an adviser will require to help achieve their clients’ goals.

When I tell my clients, “it is my role to lose sleep over market volatility and I don’t lose sleep over markets” – this is why.

For further information or advice, speak to your adviser or get in touch with the Findex Wealth Management team, who can help you develop a financial plan and investment strategy to meet your current and future goals.