A Day in the Life of a CeFA
It is often difficult to understand the life of a CeFA: that is a certified financial advisor. The complex world of financial advising is often construed as one long string of business meetings, restaurant lunches and a good sprinkling of cases dealing with high profile corporate mergers, but while this is true some of the time, most financial advisors spend their days and a good proportion of their evenings pouring over stock charts, low risk investment opportunities and market conditions that may affect their client's portfolio. It is said that you never really understand someone until you’ve walked around in their shoes for a day so let us now walk through the average day of a financial advisor and dispel some of the glitz and glamour shall we?
7:30am Arrive at office and review the previous day's meeting on equities’ pricing data. With company earnings less than a week away, it is necessary to review news reports that may negatively affect the client's major equities holding. If companies are found to be lacking or if market sentiment suspects the inability of our major holdings to miss earnings estimates, it is likely a substantial drop in share price will follow. May need to act fast on this one.
9:00am Meet with management and other CeFA colleagues to discuss new expectations for equities markets. Several new companies have fallen under our investment strategy parameters and a purchase of these securities is being considered. If an attractive entry point is identified, the group will be picking up medium sized positions in these key companies.
10:30am Meet a high value client at family home to discuss wealth protection strategies. The client is nearing retirement age and as the CeFA we are advising a shift in his portfolio to fixed, high yield income investments. We are suggesting a move our newly created low risk, high yield dividend equities fund coupled with an equal position in fixed income backed government bonds with a return on investment (ROI).
1:00pm Attend an introductory CeFA meeting with several young professionals to stress the importance of long term investment strategies and how to save a set percentage of their salary for their retirement. Explain the importance of compounded interest monetary gains as well as basic share cost averaging. Display savings difference for young adults who start in their mid 20s versus those who wait until their 30s, as this can result in tens of thousands of pounds differences. Make them glad they met a CeFA; they may remember for the future.
3:00pm Return to review the day's activities and glance at the equities’ daily performance. Check into the US markets to review foreign investments, as well as looking over the Asian markets’ closing data. Our foreign investment portfolio is doing well with the US and Chinese markets performing well in the last 18 months.
5:00pm Wrap up with all CeFA colleagues and return any client calls that came in throughout the day. Very important to keep all clients informed and satisfied to keep their business as a CeFA.
