As markets roil, advisors toil: how you handled the SVB fallout
ADVISOR EDGE - MICHELLE SCHRIVER
Amid fraught headlines, here’s how financial advisors served clients this week.
Volatile markets this past week reflect a global financial system under pressure as banks in the U.S. and Europe struggle under the weight of rising interest rates. Amid the turmoil, some financial advisors seized the opportunity to have proactive conversations with clients, uncover their concerns, and buy cheap investments to get clients to their goals sooner.
Ngoc Day, a financial advisor with Macdonald, Shymko & Company Ltd. in Vancouver, said she wasn’t concerned about contagion following the collapse of a couple U.S. regional banks, given the prompt action taken by the Federal Reserve.
Central bank support undergirds confidence and stops bank runs, Day said. (Whether bailouts are fair to taxpayers is another question, she added. The Associated Press reported that U.S. banks have borrowed nearly US$165 billion from the central bank this past week.)
And, while clients haven’t been calling her, Day has been on the horn anyway.
“Phone calls I’ve been doing this week are more proactive calls to clients,” she said. “It’s a good check-in point” to show clients you care and are on top of a developing situation. Some clients may avoid calling so that they don’t come across as unnecessarily nervous, she said.
Plus, the timing of the current banking crisis is tough given last year’s poor market performance. “Bonds have gone down, stocks have gone down,” she said. “It’s better for us to be proactive.”