financial planning

At a broad industry level, FoFA has provided the impetus required to kick-off a cultural shift toward a greater level of professionalism. One of the most significant challenges we face is changing the traditional values of a sales culture which has seen clients charged trail commissions, in some cases without any ongoing service element. With the cost of living at front of mind for most consumers, it's an interesting challenge our industry faces to alter public perception.

Silence is the sweetest sound for self-managed super fund trustees on federal budget night. Although it was anticipated that there would be nothing new in the budget affecting super after the announcements on 5 April, it says something about the uncertainty created by the recent public debate on super, that there was a collective sigh of relief across the trustee population when the federal treasurer Wayne Swan resumed his seat on Tuesday night with super unscathed.

According to research, there is a strong correlation between this anxiety and low levels of financial literacy.

Improving financial literacy is a long-term societal goal by the government and the financial services industry. The question is – while we work on long-term plans to address this, what can we do in the short term?

 Self-managed superannuation

If asked, most clients would probably say that their children are priceless, but as figures demonstrate, they’re certainly not cheap. A 2007 study indicated that the typical Australian family spends $537,000 on raising two children from birth to age 21 on expenses such as housing, clothing, food, energy, transport, recreation and education. 

 Commonwealth Bank currency strategist Joseph Capurso said the strength of the Australian dollar improved after the United States Federal Reserve released the minutes of its late April policy meeting.

Hastings Funds Management and 

• Financial Adviser's blog
• Read more

There is a common, and rather unfortunate, perception that Generation Y (the generation consisting of persons born after 1981) is a particularly nasty generation of spoiled brats and spendthrifts. Generally perceived as having insatiable spending habits, older generations seem to believe that this young demographic group is functionally incapable of being financially responsible yet this misconception is highly unwarranted.