Mr Bloom
By chance a client of mine linked me to some of your YouTube outbursts. May I say that I agree with you 100% about FSA & in particular RDR. If I may, however, pick you up on a minor point. It is NOT only IFA’s that are being targeted in regard to FSA & RDR.
I am a 6th generation stockbroker who has endured the marvels of regulation and in fact like some others I know been on the receiving end of FSA directives that on numerous occasions have impacted on the way that I handle clients. Unfortunately thanks to some underhand planning by larger competitors and trade bodies that were initially set up by the ‘old’ established stockbrokers (I’m referring to the CISI.org) to protect our interests and more importantly those of investors, these same bodies now insist that older more experienced personnel should undertake an orwellian examination process that will drive many of us to despair and perhaps extinction. In effect we are NOT only being dictated to by non-practitioners, people who in many cases don’t have the faintest idea about anything financial, but our valuable franchises are under threat with no exit plans in place. Why should anyone purchase a client bank when they can await RDR and simply ride in and steal goodwill? This in my view what has been the main thrust of RDR. Many of the existing HNW wealth managers simply have nowhere to turn to for new business so by influencing FSA and the quangoes into stereotyping us and pidgeon-holing us it’s relatively easy to target the private unassuming stockbrokers who manage true independent bespoke portfolios (note fees have only been introduced relatively recently by many of us) and give advice daily on exchange products (this is a very different universe to the more detailed advisory commitments made by IFA’s).
I have by my desk a cellophaned telephone directory entitled (cost £150) “Private Client Investment Advice & Management” written by CISI and split into 4 modules;-
1 Financial Advice Within a Regulated Environment (why should it be any different to financial advice outside a regulated environment i.e prior to 1986?)
2. Investment Taxation (not the universe of stockbrokers but usually accountants & tax advisers)
3. Financial Markets (Pertinent to what we do but I doubt the topic could be defined in such a small volume)
4. Trusts and Trustees (again like investment taxation very useful but in this instance more pertinent to solicitors)
As you can gather I have no intention whatsoever of proceeding further with FSA/CISI’s little game.
It’s interesting to note that since ‘Big Bang’ banks have moved into our domain and that many of our other core clients, firms of solicitors mainly, have formulated investment management FSA regulated firms. The crossover of trustees and partners and legal executives versus investment management in these firms surely compounds potential conflicts of interest but because it’s supported by legal boffins no-one thinks twice about the long-term ramifications. The same thing occurs daily in the investment banks with hedge funds et al and again the conflicts are ignored. Yet when it comes to true independence as exemplified by IFAs and private stockbrokers the FSA wants to kill us off and prevent many of us from even giving advice. This is the sovietisation of markets and something needs to be done about it. Is it any wonder that FSA (& its forerunner) has presided over the closure of over 200 private client stockbroking firms since 1986 many of whom have been targeted by the regulators. The LSE has stood back and watched this horror story unfold too. It’s time the UK had its own independent exchange run and owned by its members with a regulatory universe consigned to the dustbin; investors protection can better be governed by simple insurance products in my opinion.
I’d be happy to discuss these topics further. Please pass on my regards to Nigel Farage. Keep up the fight!
Richard Hoblyn FCSISkype: richardhoblyn
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