“We are excited to continue expanding our areas of
expertise, as well as our geographic reach, through the hiring of exceptional
attorneys like William Scogland and Ellen Stone, who are recognized for their
outstanding credentials and comprehensive experience,” says Marcia Wagner,
managing director of the firm, which also has offices in Miami and San Francisco.
Scogland has over 30 years of experience in employee
benefits and executive compensation. He is the former chair of the U.S.
Department of Labor’s Advisory Council on Employee Welfare and Pension Benefit
Plans. Scogland joins Wagner from Jenner & Block LLP, where he was the
practice leader of 10 attorneys and maintained responsibility for the firm’s
compensation and benefit matters. His experience includes counseling large
pension plans and investment managers on investment rules and regulations
prescribed by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA). He also has
extensive experience in funded welfare benefit plans and executive
compensation.
Stone is a tax attorney with a background in ERISA matters
and estate planning, as well as employee benefit plan and individual taxation.
She was previously employed at Fresenius Medical Care North America
Corporation, where she provided legal advice to human resource and benefits
personnel regarding compliance with federal tax laws governing employee benefit
plans.
The
Wagner Law Group offers support on ERISA law, employment law, human resources,
employee benefits, corporate law, taxation, estate planning, real estate and
litigation. More information about the firm can be found here.
Wary
of economic recession and volatile markets, young workers are going the way of
their grandparents and great-grandparents when it comes to investments and money
management.
Data from the quarterly UBS
Investor Watch report shows that by some key measures, Millennials are the
most fiscally conservative generation since those who came of age during the
Great Depression. And while Millennials tend to value and seek advice,
financial services professionals must compete with spouses and family members
to win the generation’s ear.
UBS finds Millennials’ attitudes about money, risk and
success have been shaped mainly by two phenomena. These include access to rapid
technological innovation and dramatic economic volatility that has constrained employment
prospects and earning abilities. Also important to Millennials is the disruption
in their parents’ wealth prospects caused by the recent financial crises,
especially depressions in real estate values and retirement savings lost to tumbling
markets.
Report data shows that concern is a two-way street. The parents
of Millennial workers worry that their children will have a harder time
achieving financial stability and success—and they feel they must help along
the way.
Despite Millennials’ use of and interest in technology and
social media, the generation is no more self-directed than other generations
when it comes to making investment decisions and setting financial goals.
Rather than relying exclusively on media and online sources, Millennials report
that they prefer face-to-face advice from people they trust—particularly family
members or a family-referred adviser.
The upshot for advisers is that building trust and long-term
relationships with Millennials or their parents may be a good way to win
business from the groups.
Millennials show an even stronger conservative streak when
it comes to such things as asset allocations and risk tolerance. For instance,
Millennials tend to associate the term “risk” directly with permanent portfolio
losses, rather than merely the chance of loss. They also hold more than half of
their investable assets in cash, with less than one-third (28%) in equities.
Compared
with all older generations, Millennials hold about twice the cash and half the
equities. As UBS points out, this attitude is in direct conflict with
traditional long-term investment allocation advice. In the report, UBS calls
Millennials the most worried of all generations.
Those worries are already extending to retirement, with 39%
of Millennials saying they are “highly worried” that they won’t have enough money
set aside to retire at the traditional age. Three in 10 Millennials are worried
they will have to be financially responsible for aging parents.
To address those worries, Millennials are staying
conservative and looking to build steady, long-term wealth, the report finds.
More than eight in 10 (83%) Millennials are not trying to outperform the markets,
and a significant proportion (24%) focus primarily on how they’re doing
compared with their individual financial goals—rather than comparing investment
performance to the markets.
Other telling figures from the report show Millennials are
skeptical of long-term investing as a way to achieve financial success, suggesting
advisers have a steep task in pushing younger workers to invest the way traditional
glide path allocation strategies demand. And while all generations view working
hard and living frugally as key factors for achieving success, Millennials are
the most likely to have this view—with only 28% saying long-term investing will
take them to financial success.
In addition, Millennials are the least likely to invest new sources
of money, with only 12% saying that they would invest new income streams,
compared with 33% of investors in older generations. Instead, Millennials
prioritize paying down debt, especially college loans.
For advisers, perhaps the most significant finding in the
report is that only 9% of Millennials made their last key financial decision without
consulting someone. But unlike other generations, Millennials are more likely
to consult their spouse, parents or friends. While some do research online,
young workers are no more likely than other generations to use online sources
for key financial advice. Just 14% of Millennials have an outstanding relationship
with a financial adviser.
A
full copy of the UBS Investor Watch
report, which is compiled quarterly by the financial services firm UBS Wealth
Management Americas and incorporates input from thousands of investors, is
available here.