The Four Cornerstones of Prudent Investing
The Jentner ProActive Investment Strategy™ is a passively-engineered investment strategy based on the four cornerstones of prudent investing. These cornerstones guide our investment process, the construction of portfolios, and the management of accounts. Our investment strategy is designed to comply with the Uniform Prudent Investor Act.
There are no safe havens.1
FACT: Fixed-income investments, such as U.S. Treasurys, cash, and CDs, are often outperformed by equities, the purchasing power of cash lags behind inflation, and gold is extremely volatile.
SOLUTION: Invest prudently and systematically in broad, globally diversified asset classes, including alternative investments.
Market timing is hazardous.2
FACT: The majority of active managers fail to outperform the market, and those who will outperform the market are unpredictable, and their performance is temporary.
SOLUTION: Employ a passive investment strategy to lower a portfolio’s risk and increase the likelihood of a successful investment experience over the long term.
Concentrated portfolios are risky.3
FACT: In two out of five cases, individual stocks underperform the market by more than 15%, and an asset class can be the top performer one year and the worst performer the following year.
SOLUTION: Invest broadly across the global market to lower the risk of one’s portfolio being brutally damaged by one company, asset class, or country’s failure.
Emotions are more powerful than logic.4
FACT: Investors whose emotions are involved in investment decisions underperform the overall market by 8.5%.
SOLUTION: Adhere to a passively engineered investment philosophy that uses logic and not emotions, which has historically resulted in the long-term growth of investments.
You cannot afford these risky behaviors. Instead, The Jentner ProActive Investment Strategy™ is globally diversified, passively engineered, and focused on long-term returns while reducing overall risk. We do this by choosing institutional asset-class funds, index mutual funds, and exchange-traded funds. Jentner concentrates on global diversification, looking at the total portfolio instead of the individual investments within it. The result is positive, attractive returns over most market cycles.
According to:
1) Comparing Returns Between Investments by SunGard
2) S&P Indices Versus Active Scorecard by S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC
3) Percentage of S&P 1500 Companies Underperforming by 15 Percent or More by FactSet Research Systems
4) The Quantitative Analysis of Investor Behavior by Dalbar
Are you concerned about the fate of your wealth?
Do you understand how prepared you are for the future?
Consider a Portfolio Second Opinion from Jentner Wealth Management. This is a professional investment review of your investment holdings. Your tailored report will analyze:
Investment policy
Diversification and allocation
Risk vs. return and risk tolerance
Historical returns and benchmarks
Costs, turnover, and tax efficiency
Transparency
Alignment with goals
The report will also provide suggestions for increasing your portfolio’s strength.
Successful wealth management involves financial planning, investment management, and values-based life planning – our areas of knowledge and experience.
ProActive Investment Management
Passively engineered investing
Globally diverse investing
Held to fiduciary standard
Cost-effective and tax-efficient investing
Risk-appropriate asset allocations
Disciplined rebalancing
Cash flow and investment distribution planning
Written investment policy statement
Goal-Centered Financial Planning
Retirement
Estate
Insurance
Legacy
Business succession
Education
Life transition
Tax
Continual Communication
Personal meetings with your wealth advisor
Client education and events
Newsletters, statements, market updates, etc.
Personal wealth management website
Institutional Trustee Services
Investment management
Wealth transfer guidance
Trust administration through Charles Schwab Bank
Types of Clients Served
Individuals and families
Trusts
Business retirement plans
Foundations and endowments
Five Questions for Making the Right Decision about Wealth Management
If you answer “yes” to any of these five questions, consider talking with the wealth management professionals of Jentner Wealth Management!
1
Are you at the point where professional planning pays off?
The typical entry point for using personal, professional financial advice and wealth management services is $500,000. If you have exceeded or are approaching that mark, consider how strategic wealth management can help you secure the future you want from your assets.
2
Are you tired of chasing the promises of active investment management?
Play it cool: proactive management and broad, highly diverse, global asset-class investing avoid the unnecessary risks of broker-based management. Consider working with a financial manager who is focused on increasing your wealth, not the number of transactions you make.
3
Have you been going it alone without advice and support?
Relationship-based planning – taking into account interviews and planning sessions, an understanding of your needs and goals – is a whole other level of effective wealth management. If you have been making do without it, consider the difference collaboration could make in your comfort level and your results.
4
Would you like to simplify your sources of financial advice?
There’s a difference between wealth management strategists and other financial professionals. An insurance agent, accountant, estate/trust attorney, bank officer, or broker will each provide you with a useful service. But each may only see his slice of the pie. In contrast, a strategic wealth manager combines financial planning and investment management and bases it on your goals and your situation.
5
Are you ready to retire or planning for retirement?
Our client base typically consists of those with more than $1 million in retirement/legacy funds to invest. If you are in that position or are committed to getting there, and you are unsure about the services available to you from other sources, consider a no-cost Introduction Meeting with Jentner Wealth Management or a Portfolio Second Opinion.
Many people assume that all financial advisors act in their client’s best interest. However, under current law, many advisors are not obligated to place their client’s best interests first.
Estimates show that approximately 85% of financial advisors do not have fiduciary responsibility. Many insurance agents, stockbrokers, and financial planners operate under a suitability standard, meaning they are merely required to make recommendations that are suitable at the time of sale. They may have several licenses, but because they are not fiduciaries, they can be motivated by commissions earned from selling insurance and investment products.
These conflicts of interest cost investors billions of dollars every year. The White House Council of Economic Advisers estimates that non-fiduciary advice costs Americans 1% of their return annually. Those small losses can really add up. Over 35 years, a loss of 1% annually could reduce total savings by more than 25%.
In contrast, registered investment advisors (RIAs) are legally required to act as a fiduciary all of time. RIAs must make recommendations believed to be in their client’s best interest, acting prudently and in utmost good faith with the care, skill, and judgment of a professional. More so, RIAs have to avoid conflicts of interest, operate with full transparency, control their client’s investment expenses, and continue to monitor their client’s investments and financial situation. For fiduciaries, the first client meeting marks only the beginning of the advisor’s legal obligation.
Jentner Wealth Management is an RIA and operates as a fiduciary 100% of the time, putting your needs ahead of our own. We don’t earn commissions, which can create conflicts of interest. Instead, we provide our clients with ongoing financial advice that we believe is in their best interest.
You know the danger of putting all your eggs in one basket. The wise investor avoids such danger, choosing portfolio diversification to provide stability and lower risk. Jentner manages wealth by taking diversification to a whole new level. Our proven process deploys a broad range of asset classes, enhanced indexing, alternative investments and regular, disciplined rebalancing.
Breadth. In-depth analysis directs the allocation of your investments to a broad range of up to 16 asset classes: much broader diversification than is typically achieved. Asset classes include large and small stocks, value and growth stocks, international and domestic and emerging markets, government and corporate bonds, domestic and foreign bonds, and more.
Scope. Jentner’s investment strategy is more than simply selecting a popular index fund. You gain access to institutional asset-class funds representing thousands of companies – funds offered by few others. These funds are designed to represent entire market segments, in sharp contrast to typical mutual funds that invest in a mere 30-150 companies chosen by the fund managers.
Balance. Managing wealth is a dynamic process. Disciplined rebalancing keeps you on target. Portfolios shift with market changes, life events can change, and new factors can affect your desired level of risk. Rebalancing is critical to achieving your objectives. It controls portfolio value “drift,” keeping you near the risk level you anticipated, and promotes buying low and selling high.
With relatively low turnover, institutional asset-class mutual funds, ETFs and index funds incur lower costs, less trading expense and are more tax efficient.
Disclosures and disclaimers: Keep in mind that while diversification may help reduce volatility and risk, it does not guarantee future performance. Investors cannot invest directly in indexes. Indexes attempt to benchmark the performance of individual asset classes and markets.
What some money managers call “active” we call overheated. Active management is risky behavior. In recent years we’ve seen unprecedented market volatility, and active management – which seeks to pick hot stocks or time the market – is like playing with fire. Proactive management uses investment analysis, asset allocation, alternative investments and disciplined rebalancing to support a passively engineered philosophy. This is not a buy-and-hold strategy. It’s the cool-headed approach. Coolness rewards the prudent investor.
The way to manage the modern portfolio.
We developed The Jentner ProActive Investment Strategy™ to provide clients a plan for life-long investing. Our strategy follows these important proactive investing principles:
Manage risk by diversifying the investments among various asset classes and alternative investments.
Employ institutional funds that offer distinct advantages.
Focus on the total portfolio, not individual investments within it.
Reward steady, life-long investing.
Studies show that portfolios using passive asset-class funds can be designed to deliver a higher expected return for a chosen level of risk over time.*
For the facts behind why a passively engineered investment strategy beats active management, read our white papers on The Active Versus Passive Investing Debate and The Four Cornerstones of Prudent Investing.
*According to the Standard & Poor’s Indices Versus Active Funds Scorecard and Asset Management: Active Versus Passive Management by Rex A. Sinquefield
Our planning process begins with a series of precisely focused meetings:
Introduction Meeting: A no-cost meeting to discuss your needs and expectations.
Discovery Meeting: Together, we address and understand your history, objectives, goals, values, and financial situation.
Proposal Meeting: We describe how we can help you and what it will cost. There is no sales pitch; you decide if our services fit your needs.
Planning Sessions: A series of meetings over several months allows us to complete your financial plan as well as your investment policy statement and investment allocation.
Implementation: We work with you to execute your plan, which may include the following:
→ Investment management
→ Retirement planning
→ Estate planning
→ Insurance/risk management (We do not sell insurance.)
→ Legacy planning
→ Business succession planning
→ Education planning
→ Life transition planning
→ Tax planning