In Perspectives

When I was nine or ten years old, my grandfather taught me how to play poker.  He brought out his loose change jar and counted out twenty five pennies for each of us, and walked me through a simple game of five-card draw.  I enjoyed learning the hierarchy of winning hands, and the strategy of deciding which cards to hold and which to throw away.  I loved seeing my shiny pile of pennies slowly build up.  What I wasn’t prepared for was how much it stung when I lost most of them back to Grandpa on a lucky draw of three of a kind.  I was so upset to see them go  – and they weren’t even my pennies to begin with!

I was never a gambler at heart, even then.  And as I remind everyone who asks me for a tip on a hot stock, gambling and investing are not the same things.  My job as an investment adviser is to help clients protect and grow their wealth in a prudent and measured manner.  But this very human reaction to losses definitely plays out in the savings and investment arena in a multitude of ways.  I think part of the reason we feel losses so keenly is because they can happen quickly, while sustainable gains take time to build.

So often our natural human emotions lead us to respond to negative events quickly and often rashly rather than to apply our rational side and anticipate the events that are likely to come next.  This tendency points to a key reason why it can be so advantageous to partner with an adviser when making financial decisions.  While many wealth advisers like myself spend a great deal of time studying the financial markets and building expertise so that we can help you to mitigate losses in the first place, a major part of our job is also to help you maintain a long term view that looks beyond recent setbacks – to be the little voice on your shoulder, reminding you to stay the course.  Market corrections are disconcertingly common but responsible planning renders their effects to be much less harmful.

At Legacy Trust we work with our clients to ensure that near-term cash flow needs are planned for and are not subject to stock market volatility, whether that means those needs will be met from fixed income investments, equity dividends, hedging strategies or some combination of factors as each set of client circumstances dictates.  While human nature will always lead us to feel market losses keenly and painfully, keeping a long-term perspective when it matters most (especially when it runs contrary to our instincts) will ultimately lead to financial success.

NPR’s All Things Considered did a segment last week on this topic – here’s a link if you’d like to listen.

www.npr.org/2014/04/03/298779778/one-more-speed-bump-for-your-retirement-fund-basic-human-impulse

Legacy Trust and Your Right to Financial Privacy

At Legacy Trust we have established policies and practices that respect the financial privacy of all individuals who use our trust company. We believe it is critical to comply with the laws and regulations designed to secure your financial privacy. Your relationship with us as our client is very important to us, and we want you to understand our policies and practices about handling your information.

This Policy applies to you – This Policy applies to our relationships with individual clients who inquire about or obtain products or services from us for personal, family and household purposes.

Strict security measures – We take the security of information very seriously. We have established security standards and procedures to prevent access to client information. We maintain physical, electronic and procedural safeguards to guard client information.

Limited employee access – We have established procedures to limit employee access to information to only those employees with a business reason for accessing such information. We educate our employees about the importance of confidentiality and client privacy. We take appropriate disciplinary measures to enforce employee responsibilities regarding client information.

Why we collect information – We collect information about you to:

  • accurately identify you;
  • protect and administer your records, accounts and funds;
  • help us design or improve our products and services;
  • understand your financial needs;
  • save you time when you apply for new products and services; offer you quality products and services; and comply with certain laws and regulations;

We collect information – We collect and maintain your personal information so that we can provide investment management and other services to you. The types and categories of information that we collect and maintain about you include:

  • Information we receive from you to open an account or provide investment advice or other services to you (such as your home address, social security number, telephone, financial information and investment objectives).
  • Information that we generate to service your account or from our transactions with you (such as account statements and other financial information).
  • Information on your transactions with nonaffiliated third parties.

We have established procedures so that the financial information we collect is accurate, current and complete. We are committed to work with you to promptly correct any inaccurate information.

Our selective sharing of information – In order for us to provide investment management and other services to you, we do disclose your personal information in very limited instances, which include:

  • Disclosures to nonaffiliated companies as permitted by law, including those who help us service your account (such as providing account information to brokers and custodians).
  • Other limited disclosures as permitted by law, for example, required reports to government entities.

We do not share your information with third parties for marketing purposes. We do not sell your information.

Former clients – If you end your relationship with us, we will continue to adhere to the privacy policies and practices described in this notice.

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USA PATRIOT Act

Important Information About Procedures For Opening A New Account

To help the government fight the funding of terrorism and money laundering activities, Federal law requires all financial institutions to obtain, verify and record information that identifies each person who opens an account.

What this means for you: When you open an account, we will ask for your name, address, date of birth and other information that will allow us to identify you. We may also ask to see your driver’s license or other identifying documents.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause; however, federal law prohibits us from waiving these requirements.

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