Lewis Lacey Capital Management FAQ's

Lewis Lacey Capital Management provides a fee-only, cutting edge personal and professional investment experience with an emphasis on strong after-tax performance and long-term relationships with our clients.  Quite simply, we attempt to take the worry out of personal finance and help individuals and families make wise financial decisions at critical times in their lives.

The current state of the economy not only in Milwaukee, WI but also throughout the nation has definitely contributed to financial stress and anxiety among individual investors.  The predominant sentiment of the average investor is fear, cynicism, disillusionment with old theories, tired advisors, myopic money managers.  The options available to many are lackluster due to the professional seeming less skilled at building solutions and more likely to sell products or recommend complex instruments.  Instead of focusing on outcomes or setting goals, too many are focused on marketing, growing assets, and hosting fancy client events.

Milwaukee based wealth management provider, Lewis Lacey Capital Management, believes there are no shortcuts in knowledge and analysis.  Professional portfolio management is a disciplined skill that can be improved with education and experience [but don’t leave out the realism of everyday common sense!].  The basic realities of risk and return, of cost vs. value, and the importance of integrity and self-knowledge do not change because the topic is money management.

Our goal is to promote healthy investment behavior – advocating a disciplined unemotional approach to investing.  Decisions based on emotions can be very costly, as they all too often lead investors to buy high and to sell low.

Trust – Seek out people you like, trust, and who listen to you!  To begin developing trust in your financial planner and investment manager, you should be able to ask them about their experience, expertise, credentials and references. A salesperson or broker may have a financial background but rarely has the experience or credentials to fundamentally analyze prospective investment opportunities being made on your behalf.

More importantly, you want to work with an advisor that will act as a fiduciary.  A financial advisor held to a fiduciary standard occupies a position of special trust and confidence when working with a client.  As a fiduciary, the financial advisor is required to act with undivided loyalty to the client.  This includes disclosure of how the financial advisor is to be compensated and any corresponding conflicts of interest.  Not all advisors are required to act as fiduciaries, ask the question.

Competence - Since Lewis Lacey Capital Management believes proper diversification among different asset classes and minimizing fees and tax consequences associated with investing are critical to investment success, we have a consulting arrangement with Charles S. Lewis, IV of Lewis Capital Management. This arrangement allows consultation with a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA), and former attorney who has practiced as a CPA, with over three decades of experience in portfolio and tax management.

Independence- One factor that is often neglected when people choose a financial professional is their independence. The assumption is that if they work for a recognizable institution, they must be free of any conflict of interest issues. The reality is many advisors at well-known institutions are compensated in ways that compromise their independence. Some advisors have affiliations with other financial companies (e.g. insurance, banks) which compensate the advisor for putting clients in investments managed by the affiliated company. Advisors that are not strictly fee-based may also be compensated via commissions generated on the purchase or sale of investments for their clients.

Lewis Lacey Capital Management does not have an affiliation with any insurance company, major wire house or financial institution. Lewis Lacey Capital Managements fee is based solely on a percentage of assets under management and is not compensated via incentives or commissions when purchasing or selling investments on behalf of its clients.

Accessibilty - An often overlooked criteria that should be a primary factor to look for is timely access to the asset manager of your account. Frustration can set in when a salesperson can not answer the questions you have about the investments in your portfolio.

As a boutique Milwaukee based Registered Investment Advisor, our clients have direct access to their portfolio manager. Rather than being two or three persons removed from the investment professional performing analytics and making the investment decisions, your private financial advisor at Lewis Lacey Capital Management can provide you with thorough and logical explanations to your questions in a relaxed setting in our Milwaukee office locations.

Security –You should ask which custodian your investment advisor uses, i.e where your assets are held. Is it an institution that is a potential party to a conflict of interest or is it a custodian that is completely independent?

Lewis Lacey Capital Management uses the services of Charles Schwab, an established custodian firm at which independent Registered Investment Advisors (RIA) can rely on for news, trading, research and custody of their clients’ assets. Lewis Lacey Capital Management never takes custody of client assets and its only power is to make investments on behalf of the client. Clients can access their portfolio online at any time.

We are regulated by the Wisconsin Department of Financial Institutions (DFI).  This registration doesn't mean that the person is recommended by the DFI, it simply means that they are regulated by the DFI.

We are compensated by fees determined on the assets under management, not commissions on products that are sold, like some in the industry.  Fee-only not only describes how we are compensated but rather describes one who has minimized potential conflicts of interest and works only for the client.  True fee-only advisors are a rare breed.

Lewis Lacey Capital Management is a fee-only Registered Investment Advisor.  What this means is that we do not work on commission but rather charge an annual fee based on the total market value of the portfolio.  Typically, fees are equal to 1% per year of the first one million of total market value, and .50% per year above one million of total market value.  However fees are negotiable.  Fees are typically paid by direct deduction from the portfolio each quarter.

Comprehensive: A good financial planner looks at every aspect of his or her clients' financial situations, from their budgets to their estate plans. That's the only way to give truly customized, comprehensive planning advice and know that you are on track to meet your goals.

CFA: We believe the CFA designation is the only meaningful designation indicating training in portfolio management and securities analysis and that a CFA Charterholder is to investment management what a CPA is to the tax and accounting profession.

Our goal is to be trustworthy. We believe that the Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct developed by the CFA Institute is a very high standard for fair treatment of clients. A summary of the Chartered Financial Analyst designation and the ethical standard follows.
CFA Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct

The Chartered Financial Analyst Designation

First awarded in 1963, the CFA charter has become known as the gold standard of professional credentials within the global investment community. Around the world, employers and investors recognize the CFA designation as the definitive standard for measuring competence and integrity in the fields of portfolio management and investment analysis.

The CFA Institute Mission

To lead the investment profession globally by setting the highest standards of ethics, education, and professional excellence.

The curriculum develops and reinforces a fundamental knowledge of investment principles. The three levels of examination verify a candidate’s ability to apply these principles across all areas of the investment decision-making process. And the program’s professional conduct requirements demand that both CFA candidates and charterholders adhere to the highest standards of ethical responsibility.

In the competitive, rapidly evolving profession of investment management, few achievements will say more about your commitment to knowledge and high ethical standards than earning the CFA charter. Many investors include the CFA charter in the criteria they use to select the firms and individuals who manage their financial assets. The global investment community at large recognizes the CFA designation as a symbol of professional excellence.

The dramatic growth of candidates and charterholders is a tribute to the CFA Program’s focus on candidate learning and the desire among investment professionals to achieve and maintain high standards. Successful completion of each of the three levels of the program represents a significant achievement in professional career development.

The CFA Program’s curriculum is designed to reflect a Body of Knowledge that keeps pace with the ever-changing dynamics of the global investment community. This Body of Knowledge, developed through an extensive survey of practicing CFA charterholders, consists of 10 general topic areas:

• Ethical and Professional Standards 
• Quantitative Methods
• Economics
• Financial Statement Analysis
• Corporate Finance
• Analysis of Equity Investments
• Analysis of Fixed-Income Investments
• Analysis of Alternative Investments
• Portfolio Management
• Derivatives