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Wall Street Foxes in the 401(k) Hen House |
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Submitted by Steve Selengut
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An old (Jan, '03) New York Times article announces a new service that the "Masters of the Universe" are gearing up to provide to the poor unfortunates that lost most of their 401(k) nest eggs in the "pretend" Bear Market of early '00 to early '03.
Basically, Mutual Fund marketers will now be allowed to advise individual plan participants how to select from the funds offered by their employers...for an additional fee of up to 1.5%. Let's see what Wall Street professional "Deep Pockets" has to say about this scam! [My stuff is in brackets.]
WRAP! WRAP! [On the 401(k) door.]
Who's there? [The innocent investor replies.]
The Pin Striped Fox.
Which fox is that?
The Wall Street Fox that mauled and maimed your Investment, Retirement, and Educational Accounts a few years ago.
Why are you back now?
I'm here to advise you how to recover from the near fatal wounds I inflicted upon you and your loved ones then.
Once again the sheep line up to be slaughtered. The same financial professionals who brought the high risk Internet, Technology, and Global Growth Funds to market at the top of the "Tech Bubble" in 2000 are back, licensed to steal.
A new Labor Department ruling allows 401(k) providers to offer the advice they have previously been barred from providing. It's like non-lawyers giving legal advice legally. Back in 2000, many of these same institutions fired their Value Fund managers as they strived to meet the market's insatiable demand for growth and the quick buck.
All of them cast Asset Allocation and the "Old Economy" aside as they rushed to clear their new IPOs of high risk Mutual Funds through an understaffed SEC, rushing in to garner their (un)fair share of the high fees and expenses extracted from investors.
Now they've got a brand new scam to grab investors' capital. A double whammy! Collect the [business as usual] high fees and expenses from their Mutual Fund products AND then tack on a "Wrap Fee" for electronically choosing which of these very same products
uniquely meet the participants' retirement goals!
The Mutual Fund and Insurance Companies are offering to protect you from themselves for a fee. It's like trusting a drug dealer to sell you a pill to cure your addiction...[and you get a new fix each quarter whether you need it or not.]
How can a company that sells only their own proprietary products charge a fee to select investments from these very same products AND claim to be objective! The same companies that disowned Asset Allocation in 2000 now want to sell the concept! Ridiculous!
There are new and improved ways for employees to have, and to manage, a 401(k) plan. Make sure you learn about them. [If you read the fine print, you'll see that the quarterly rebalancing act is based on the same research techniques that got you into the tech bubble burst in the first place. Keep in mind just who is programing the
computors. This applies to financial professionals as well.]
If you fall for the scam of having an Annuity or Mutual Fund company pick the investments in your 401(k) or retirement account for a "WRAP Fee", you will get the disaster that you deserve. Has everyone already forgotten the ongoing scandals that Mr. Spitzer and others have brought to light concerning client abuses by Mutual Fund and Insurance Companies? [These are the same people, people. Caveat Emptor!].
The Wall Street business downturn of 2000-2003 has made the Financial Fox very hungry. But this time is different...you've learned your lesson. Lock the hen house door and tell the fox to stay away.
{Many of you will remember "Deep Pockets" from his contributions to "The Brainwashing of the American Investor", still "The Book that Wall Street does not want YOU to Read"!}
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