This is dedicated to all the financial advisors who treat their clients’ money as if it was their own…

I admire your willingness to offer opinions. Over the years, I have reflected on giving advice and have come to the conclusion that I shouldn’t do it. It really isn’t worth it to me and it’s one of the reasons why Hedgefolios is about helping people make their own decisions. So here goes my jaded philosopy…

1) If you give someone good advice and they take it, they will usually take credit for it as their own idea.
People love to be right.
2) If you give someone good advice and they don’t take it, they will usually forget that you gave them the advice.
People don’t like to be wrong.
3) If you give someone bad advice and they take don’t take it, they might forget that you gave them bad advice.
No harm, no foul.
4) If you give someone bad advice and they take it, they will never forget that you gave it to them.
People love to blame someone else.

At the end of the day, the advice doesn’t matter much - it only matters if the investor made money or lost it. In the words of the author named “Unknown” - “It is amazing how much you can accomplish when it doesn’t matter who gets the credit.” If this market gets any tougher, investors will likely start to put some heat on their advisors. For that I have come up with a converse statement… “It is amazing how little you will accomplish when it matters who is to blame.” So if you start becoming tempted to blame your advisor for what is happening to your portfolio, please remember that they are doing the best that they can to make you money - they aren’t looking for the credit and have way too much experience getting blame.