Nobel Prize Winning Economist Daniel Kahneman single handedly launched a whole new genre of economic study… Behavioral Finance. In his book “Thinking, Fast and Slow”, he talks about how both emotional and deliberative thinking figures into the client-advisor relationship…
I know that sounds boring but it’s actually a pretty interesting… and helpful read. Here are some tidbits:
• He talks about a well-known money manager that invested tens of millions into Ford stock after being to an auto show… without even doing an analysis—he just used his gut. Wow!
• He walks through why many investors we work with seem downright crazy in the way they interpret risk… avoiding sane and reasonable investments, while investing in risky ones—all under the auspices that they are making a conservative decision.
• How a study of 10,000 brokerage accounts of individuals over 7 years showed that the stocks people sold did better after the fact… than those they held onto by a substantial amount. Why does this occur… and how to capitalize on it.
I could go on and on, but this book is fascinating and an excellent tool to the discerning financial advisor.
I use the facts and ideas extensively throughout the 5Q selling process and it is instrumental in getting clients to move forward… even clients that advisors thought there was no chance of getting.
