Today's investment adviser has the unenviable burden more and more information about an increasing choice o Nowadays, more investment media exist than ever be ever growing mass of literature, commented on I perience and qualifications in an environment of Against that background, the investment adv stockbroker, insurance broker, bank manager or anyone e
main responsibilities:
(1) He needs to know which in vestment media are available and . establish which are suitable for his individual clients (particularly SO following the passing of the Financial Services Act 1986).
(2) He needs to know which questions to ask about which investment medium and where to find the answers.
(3) He needs to be able to support his decision and, if necessary, show that his advice is not influenced by the method of remuneration.
(4) He must be able to make arrangements for a particular investment (or disinvestment) to be made on behalf of his clients.
(5) He will need to be kept up to date on a fast-changing regulatory framework which applies to all those in the business of providing investment advice.
Most important of all, he has to recognise his own limitations and to look for advice himself. That is the purpose of this book, which identifies the main investment media, identifies the investor for whom they are suitable or unsuitable (posing the main questions which should be asked about each medium) and provides signposts to the specialist consultants o dealers and to the legal, Tiscal and other technicalities.
1.3 TYPES OF INVESTOR
This book is concerned with people advising individual investors (including trustees and family investment companies). It is essential that the adviser identifies the particular category of investor to which his client belongs. It would be impossible to devise a precise categorisation which is exhaustrve and so it follows that the adviser must take into account a number of per-sonal factors in appraising both the investor and also the investment and disinvestment situations with which he is concerned. These factors wil include the investor's age and health, his intention with regard to his place of residence and/or domicile, his willingness to accept risk, his willingness to participate in the choice of investments and his capacity to delegate
