Roy
Smalley
April 2010 // Interviewed by
Elizabeth Millard
Fafinski Mark and Johnson
February 2010 // Interviewed by David Gee
Former Minnesota Twin
Roy Smalley is now a restaurateur and a senior vice
president/wealth advisor
with Morgan Stanley Smith
Barney LLC.
Fafinski Mark
and Johnson is
an Eden Prairie-
based, full service
law firm.
Forming an alliance: Bob [Fafinski] and I were friends literally from
the time he first started at the downtown firm, so it seemed like a natural thing to join him in the new venture. –Donald Chance Mark Jr.
Letting your work lead the way: One of our best referral sources has
been parties on the other side of a transaction. –Kevin Johnson
There’s pressure no matter your size: Executives at large, public,
global companies have the same pressures that entrepreneurs do in
smaller companies, they’re just bigger. –Robert Fafinski
More than just lawyers: We’re not just interested in dealing with
a client’s problems today, we’d like to be around to deal with their
problems five years from now. We truly care about them and we’re
looking for solutions, not necessarily the quickest way to earn a big
fee. –Donald Chance Mark Jr.
Power of the big, spirit of the small: We have the skill sets of large
firms, but we have a smaller, more focused delivery of those services.
Just because you’re small doesn’t mean you can’t go after large goals
and succeed. –Robert Fafinski
An obligatory baseball
metaphor: We act as if our
clients are standing on third
base and they just need
someone to walk them
home. We’re not trying to
hit home runs for them,
we’re trying to make sure
there are no strikeouts.
STEPS TO AVOID PONZI SCHEMES
March 2010 // Interviewed by Elizabeth Millard
We interviewed some local wealth advisors to see what you really need
to fear when it comes to Ponzi schemes.
Switching passions: At the
end of my life, I didn’t want
to say that I played baseball
for the first half of my life,
and talked about it for the
second half.
Getting better with age:
Doing this type of work
is different from baseball,
because when you’re an
athlete, you can tell when
you’re getting toward the
end of your career. But
doing this, I just feel like it
gets better.
Think long-term: You want
an advisor that’s in for the
marathon, not the sprint.
When you invest in financial
planning, the focus needs
to be on the longer-term,
on what you’re trying to
accomplish.
Be realistic: some of these Ponzi
schemes worked because people
didn’t have a solid plan that was
realistic. sometimes people think
they’ve found the holy grail, but you
have to be smart enough to ask why
an advisor seems to be succeeding at
such a surprising rate.
See the bad for what it is: there will
always be bad guys. If people ask the
right questions and set realistic goals,
they should be fine. they just need to
understand there are no shortcuts—if
something seems too good to be true,
then chances are that it is. —Kim Brown,
president of Minneapolis-based JNBA
Financial Advisors
Do your homework: Don’t rely on
testimonials from other clients
without checking them out, either.
they could be complete strangers.
Instead, check with fInrA, find out if
they’re licensed with the sEC, really
look into this individual.
—John Foster, senior investment
strategist at JNBA Financial Advisors
Be cautious of greed:
nobody is that good every
year, the way Ponzi artists
claim to be. In the next
couple years, people will be
very careful, but as greed
comes back in, there’s a
danger that some investors
won’t be asking the tough
questions.
When to run: If you start
asking questions and don’t
like the answers, run away.
Make sure your advisor is
willing to educate you, and
if the performance seems
very good, have them
explain why it’s so good.
—Bruce Langer, portfolio
manager at Minneapolis-based Tealwood Asset
Management
Use an independent custodian:
[the most common red flag] relates to
who’s holding your money, and who’s
watching out for you. Ask your advisor
about whether there’s an independent
custodian, and then get information
on that firm as well. the more
transparency you can get, the better.
Look for a paper trail: look closely
when a firm doesn’t require any
paperwork, claiming that they’re trying
to streamline the process. some ask
for money to be wired to them, and
they’ll call back to let the investor
know how things are going. Just
remember that if there’s no paper
trail, there’s probably no oversight.
Question antiquated systems: In
these uber-connected times, a
professional website is crucial for
any kind of business, but investors
need to look beyond the graphics
to what financial firms are actually
using. —Gregg Sainsbury, financial
advisor at Wayzata-based BlueChip
Advisors
