Because Money Episode 14

Despite Robb Engen's absence from this week's podcast, Jackson Middleton and I had a great time talking with our guests about why regular Canadians should care about the regulation of financial advice.

I've written about the incentives that are holding even the most decent and ethical commission-based financial advisors from giving the best advice to clients many (many, many) times, most recently here, here, here, here, and - my personal favourite - here, so I'll spare you today.

John Robertson has an excellent follow-up post Regulation of Financial Advisors up on his blog Blessed by the Potato, in which he nails the issue:

"The system needs to be reformed so that someone with no knowledge and no way to evaluate quality in advance can go to get advice from someone and trust in that advice (and get reasonable value for the fees that they pay while they’re at it). And really the best way to build trust for the lay public is to have a trustworthy expert give the thumbs-up — that is, regulation."

Our other esteemed guest Noel D'Souza has also written about the issue on his shiny new blog Do These Look Even? (and I'd bet all of my money that he'll write about it again, so stay tuned):

"For far too long, Canadians have had trouble accessing the financial advice they need,  as opposed to the product sales focused “advice” the industry usually sells. This is one of the unfortunate side-effects of a commission-based advisory model that ties advice to product sales."

As for the rest of our opinions, well, you'll have to watch the episode. (That is, until we pony up for transcripts. Again - and I'm sensing a theme here - stay tuned.)