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Originally Posted by Nevinator
I maintained an account at Fidelity for over 33 years. During that time I also held assets at JP Morgan Chase later moving those to Edward Jones and eventually moving everything to Fidelity. I managed everything myself in the 90’s and early 2000’s, but as my portfolio grew I felt like I needed professional advice. What I found was disappointing overall. Like others have said, the returns I received weren’t significantly out of tolerance +/- from the S&P for any given year. When I first moved from Chase to Edward Jones I had a very seasoned adviser who had been in the field for more than 35 years. He’d seen market changes, recessions, etc. Overall, he was a very good adviser. He retired after I had been with him about 3 years. My account was given to a brand new adviser who had recently finished training with Ed Jones and shadowed my former adviser for about a year. He initially gave me good service because I was one of his larger clients at the time but as time passed he gained new more affluent clients and I found that aside from an annual review, I didn’t hear from him unless I felt I needed something.
In 2017 I moved all my assets to Fidelity. Same level of service with investment choices mirroring my risk tolerance. Returns were average and I was paying about 1% per year as a management fee. In 2020 Covid hit. The markets initially tanked and my accounts suffered greatly. I spoke to my adviser seeking words of wisdom that would magically improve my net worth. The advice was typical: “Ride it out. Over the long term market returns have always outpaced inflation.” I was now retired and had more time on my hands so I decided it was time to quit paying people for following simple mutual fund and ETF fund selections. I fired my adviser and started managing things myself. I participated in some online webinars about options trading and watched many YouTube videos on the topic. I got approved for options trading on my accounts and started using ActiveTraderPro, Fidelity’s in house trading platform. I did this until recently.
Fidelity had me classified as an Active Trader VIP. In late 2024 I asked Fidelity for some assistance with reviewing some estate documents (one of their services) and I was told it would take two months to get an appointment. Unsatisfactory in my opinion, but I waited. I called them a couple of months later to follow up and discovered that nothing had been scheduled and they asked me to once again explain to them what I needed. That was enough for me…
I moved all of my assets to Charles Schwab. They use a trading platform called “Think or Swim” that is truly phenomenal. It runs circles around the Fidelity Investments platform and allows me to develop custom scripts and studies for evaluating stock trades. No fees for stock purchases. Small fees for options trades.
In summary, I’ve had both good and bad years doing this, but at the end of the day I am the master of my own universe with respect to having control over my account management. I do not pay thousands in adviser fees and can still call Schwab anytime I need for free advice. Lots of Schwab tutorials on YouTube. I highly recommend that anyone with half a brain and a little time on their hands learn more about managing their own finances and do it themselves.
Does anyone really think that the adviser “truly” cares whether you make money or not? They get paid whether your account goes up or down. Think of this like Bacon and Eggs. The adviser is the chicken and you’re the pig. The chicken is involved, the pig is invested. Good luck.
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Does anyone really think that the adviser “truly” cares whether you make money or not?
If that is your opinion then get rid of your advisor. A good fiduciary advisor should do his job with your desired outcome in mind. Any advisor that simply 're-balances' every quarter is not a goof fiduciary advisor. They should be contacting you when things aren't happening within your desired outcome. Otherwise, you can buy SPY and maintain your account equal with the S&P