Below are the topics that will be presented at this year's FSP Forum. Actual titles may change. For a detailed description of the program content, click on the . Click on the speaker's name for their bio.
Professional Interest Sections Key: BC = Business & Compensation Planning, EB = Employee Benefits, EP = Estate Planning, FP = Financial Planning, IM = Investment Management, LM = Leadership & Management, QP = Qualified Plans, RC = Retirement Counseling, RM = Risk Management, ALL = All Sections.
Friday, October 8
Course No.
Sections
Course Title
Speakers
7:30 am–9:30 am
CE 101
RM, EP
General Session: Financial Service Regulation in the Post-2009 World and Its Impact on Financial Advisor Practitioners
Description:
Join us as we take a page from the famous Fred Friendly Seminars that set the standard for discussion of important issues on PBS television in the 1990s. In a roundtable setting moderated in a rapid-fire, informal style by Dick Weber, MBA, CLU, our panel of experts will engage in lively give-and-take repartee on the most important issues of the day like health care, financial reform, the return of the estate tax in 2011 and beyond, sustainable income and the use of annuities, long term care, and other key issues, each from his or her own unique financial service perspective. How will changes in the health care system affect your small-business clients? What are the legal ramifications of the return of the estate tax? Will financial reform create new opportunities for advisors? Hear what the experts think in a discussion that promises to be thought-provoking, incisive, maybe even edgy at times.
How Financial Planners Can Survive the Risk of Turbulent Times
Description:
Financial planners are facing increased business and personal exposure to risk, liability, and loss. The ever-growing demands of government, claims and lawsuits from clients, the dangers of daily business operation, and the uncertainties of personal lives make it imperative that planners understand these perils. In this session, you'll learn what legal strategies are available to protect yourself, your business, and your family from financial loss. What are the current civil and criminal legal risks from new legislation? Which clients are most likely to sue? How do you protect yourself, your business, and your loved ones from the current turmoil, which has become the new norm? Get answers to these questions and take home the tools and techniques—and tactical maneuvers—to preserve and protect the rewards of your lifetime of hard work.
Retiree Health Care: A Survey of Options and Issues
Description:
Planning for future medical needs is an important aspect of retirement planning, and retirees of all ages and incomes need expert guidance in selecting coverage options best suited to their needs. In the first half of this presentation, you will learn the fundamentals of coverage options ranging from Medicare and employer-sponsored plans to state-sponsored health insurance risk sharing pools (HIRSP). The second half of the session will focus on product specifics, such as the differences between Medicare and Medicare Advantage plans, and then discuss special issues related to retiree medical care. Expect to come away with improved knowledge of coordination of benefits, assignment and much more. Topics include: Medicare, Medicare Advantage, Medicaid, State-sponsored Senior Care plans, Risk-sharing Pools, COBRA Considerations.
My Business is My Main Asset. I Want to Retire. Now What?
Description:
There are more than 30 million small business owners. Think about the business owners in your world. Their business is their primary asset. How can they retire? This session will explore how to transition business wealth into retirement assets and life insurance protection. Subtopics include: extracting business assets for retirement; succession planning; qualified plans (profit sharing, 401(k), traditional defined benefit, 412(e)(3), cash balance), market for qualified plans, sample cases; current legislative activity; buying life insurance with tax-deductible dollars.
The New World of Life Settlements: What You Really Need to Know
Description:
Aite Group, a research firm based in Boston, forecast that the life settlement market will grow to about $13 billion annually between 2010 and 2013. Consumers are being exposed to life settlements through a variety of media that includes TV, magazine advertising, and the internet. The likelihood of your clients bringing up the subject will be increasing dramatically. Effective July 1, 2010, financial professionals doing business in Illinois must complete an approved training course before they can talk about life settlements with their clients. And several other states are requiring insurance companies to make the life settlement option available to consumers. This session covers the fundamental issues of the life insurance policy resale market, including key issues such as suitability, disclosure, and regulatory practices.
University Partners Program — Presentation of Applied Research Papers
Description:
Join students and professors from prominent colleges and universities that are part of the Society's University Partners Program (UPP) as they present and discuss papers on applied financial topics of current interest to practitioners. Papers were selected for presentation on merit by professors and FSP members from the Society's 2010 Forum Colleges and Universities Task Force. This year's papers cover risk tolerance, long term care, wealth transfer, charitable giving, and retirement issues. Practitioners are invited to participate in the resulting discussions and share their knowledge.
Papers to be Presented at the 2010 FSP Forum:
Yi (Tom) Cai, Ph.D. — Cal State, Northridge Financial Goal and Risk Tolerance: An Experimental Investigation
Joseph Friedman, Ph.D. — Temple University The Downside Risk of Initiation of Social Security Benefits
Bill Rives, Ph.D., CLU, RHU, ChFC — Ohio State University
Shawn Britt, CLU, Director — Advanced Sales, Nationwide Financial The CLASS (Community Living Assistance Services and Supports) Act and Private Long-Term Care Solutions
Janeen Scott, Doctoral Student — Texas Tech University The $41 Trillion Wealth Transfer: Women in Charitable Giving and Philanthropy
Update on Special Needs research presented at 2009 Forum
Thomas Langdon, JD, LL.M., CFP, CFA — Roger Williams University Tax, Retirement & Estate Planning in a Rising Tax Rate Environment: Asset Positioning and Tax Diversification Strategies In Light of New and Anticipated Tax Law Changes
This session sponsored by the Prudential Insurance Company of America
Saturday, October 9
Course No.
Sections
Course Title
Speakers
9:45 am–11:45 am
CE 301
RM, EP, FP
Asset Protection: Avoiding the Land Mines
Description:
Asset protection planning has evolved during the last decade and become more effective than ever at protecting personal assets—if one gets started early enough. This presentation explores new and advanced techniques for asset protection while describing the pitfalls of earlier asset protection efforts. Topics include: modern asset protection trusts; advanced business entities; new retirement plans; and matrix entity structuring. The presentation is given by Jay Adkisson, author of the best selling Asset Protection: Concepts and Strategies.
Life Insurance Valuation — and the Values of Life Insurance
Description:
Life insurance, properly acquired and actively managed, can be one of the best long-term assets we can own. We've come a long way from having just two choices — term and whole life— but along with the more modern and sophisticated forms of life insurance available today, we need to understand how to value it for transfer and gift purposes. This presentation will focus on understanding, valuing, and managing life insurance as a major asset class, and will bring into focus new tools for assessment and deployment.
Sub-topics include: Fair Market Value; Life insurance as an asset class; Modern Portfolio Theory — Efficient Frontier — and life insurance; Personalized longevity studies for statistical health and life expectancy.
Annuities: Love 'em or Leave 'em, You Just Can't Outlive Them
Description:
Retirement income planning is an evolving financial planning concentration. Pension plans are becoming more and more rare. Social security (an annuity by another name) has a replacement ratio that is low for the high income worker. Responsibility for providing 30+ years of income has now fallen to the worker. Planning for retirement income is like a maze, you follow a path and just as you expect success, you hit a wall. Wealth in retirement is no longer cash in the bank but cash flow. Annuities may be the answer for many retirees. In this session, we will discuss the various annuity options and how they can provide a retiree with a successful retirement income planning strategy.
Disability Insurance in the 21st Century: New Strategies for New Times
Description:
New products, new plan variations, a higher probability of disability as longevity increases, and a changing economic climate all have played a part in transforming the disability insurance (DI) landscape. In light of these changes, the successful advisor needs to discard old-school methods and techniques in favor of strategies that reflect today's products and client perceptions. This session explores twenty-first century planning strategies that address even the most complex DI needs, giving clients more opportunities to protect their income.
University Partners Program — Business Succession Case Study
Description: "It's Not Personal, Sonny, It's Strictly Business." When the Family Business Passes from One Generation to the Next
In this interactive moderator-led session, students and professors from the Society's University Partners Program review a case study on business succession. Mr. Miller has only lately discovered that the money set aside during his business years will be insufficient to sustain a retirement of 30 years or more. He now realizes he needs to sell his business to fund that retirement. His children wonder if they can afford to buy the business at a price that meets their father's retirement income funding needs while letting them continue to operate the business. Participants will watch seasoned financial planners sort out these and related issues, address each one individually, and arrive at a financial plan that satisfies all concerns. The case is presented using Avatar technology.
2:45 pm–4:45 pm
CE 401
IM, FP, EB
Rethinking Investing for Retirement Income
Description:
"Everything you thought you knew about investing…is WRONG." While that may be somewhat exaggerated, a categorical rethinking of investment strategies for retirees and pre-retirees may result in the advisor making wholesale changes in process and method. This session also will include discussion on: Modern Portfolio Theory/Asset Allocation/Diversification now; converting from accumulation to income; insulating a portfolio from volatility; incorporating alternative investments; building around guaranteed income; building around annuities; the danger of "sustainable withdrawal rates," and the danger of over-reliance on bonds.
The New Dynamics of Modern Wealth Transfer and Asset Protection Planning — 2011 and Beyond
Description:
This informative and fast-paced presentation will demonstrate how modern wealth planning with discretionary trusts, disregarded entities and life insurance will help you create the ideal wealth and asset protection plan — planning which can help your clients forever protect their wealth from transfer taxes and creditors while maintaining the lifetime control, use, enjoyment and management of their assets. Subtopics include: creative wealth planning with grantor trusts; family limited partnerships, and family limited liability companies; planning with disregarded entities; the beneficiary defective inheritor's trust ("BDIT") — creating the ideal wealth transfer and asset protection plan; dramatically enhancing the opportunities of using life insurance by means of modern wealth planning .
AAA, Capital Accounts, and Basis Oh My: The Scary World of Pass Through Business Taxation
Description:
If you feel like you're in the land of Oz, not knowing where to turn or what to do when a business owner tells you that his or her business is structured as a Partnership, LLC or Sub Chapter S, this session is for you. This workshop will equip the financial representative with an understanding of Partnership and Sub Chapter S taxation and its impact on some of the most frequently used business insurance arrangements.
Guidelines for Professional Ethical Conduct Ethics Course
Description:
This workshop on professional ethics in practice is pre-approved to meet the two-hour CFP Board ethics CE requirement.
Designed to enhance your awareness and understanding of ethical issues facing financial service professionals, you'll engage in open dialogue on ethics with other members of your professional community, support your ethical decision-making skills, increase your understanding of the CFP Board Code of Ethics and Professional Responsibility as well as the FSP Code of Professional Responsibility. Rather than a PowerPoint presentation, the session will be interactive, involving small-group discussions of real-life situations along with the case studies.
Description:
Everyone knows that in today's business environment, everything can be commoditized, digitized, or outsourced…except Relationships! Join Ed Wallace, author of the bestselling book Business Relationships That Last, in this highly interactive and inspirational seminar designed specifically for the sales executive. By the end of this session you will know: how to internalize the Relational Ladder to transform contacts into high performing business relationships; understand your clients' Relational GPS; leave with a plan to advance your three most important business relationships; and learn a strategy to maximize your relational ROI—for both your client and yourself.
Accumulation Annuities in 2010: Roles and Regulations
Description:
"Accumulation annuities" are being sold in large numbers, to perform a variety of planning "missions." In this session, we'll look at how well (or poorly) the various types of accumulation annuities perform each mission, how regulations, imposed by multiple jurisdictions, impact that performance, and consider some "bright line tests" for determining suitability. Because the roles of accumulation annuities are changing, as are their structures to reflect their changing uses, we will consider: what accumulation annuities are; what missions they are being asked to perform; how well the various types of accumulation annuities perform each mission; and a very common myth about annuities and marginal tax rates. Because the regulations governing these contracts are changing to reflect how they will be permitted to be used, we will also consider: the current regulatory environment; the standards of "suitability" and "appropriateness" that are imposed; some potential bright line tests for suitability; and what the regulatory environment might look like in the future.
Alternative and Innovative Funding for the High Cost of Long Term Care
Description:
The most common objection to the purchase of long term care insurance is the potential waste of the premium dollars. Linked benefit products provide the solution by paying out if you need the care, die without ever needing it or just plain change your mind and want your money back! Also included in this session are the latest trends in the LTC marketplace. Subtopics include: linked benefit products; life and annuity combo products; Section 1035 exchange opportunities; trends in the LTC marketplace.
Description:
In the past, taxpayers who have had adjusted gross income (AGI) above $100,000 were precluded from converting a traditional IRA to a Roth IRA. However, beginning with the 2010 tax year, this limitation will be lifted, thereby allowing many more taxpayers the opportunity to convert to a Roth IRA. This, in turn, will open up a flood gate of activity for those professional advisors who become familiar with the basics of Roth IRAs and the mathematical factors which make them both a viable income and estate tax planning tool. During this session, we will discuss the following topics: basic rules of Roth IRAs; taxation of Roth IRA distributions; seven reasons why to convert to a Roth IRA; mathematical "mechanics" behind Roth IRA conversions; tactical considerations; Roth IRA conversion timeline; Roth IRA segregated conversion strategy.
Is Everybody Happy? Helping to Keep Your Business Client's Key Employees in the Fold and Your Client's Business Humming
Description:
Keeping key employees is an essential element of a profitable, smooth-running business. Can your small or mid-size business owner client compete with a major corporation's executive benefit plan? This session provides you with creative solutions that can help your clients reward and retain their most valuable employees while keeping your client's business goals on track. The session covers various methods of providing executive benefits including: bonus arrangements, restricted or not; deferred compensation; stock options; split dollar.
Developing and Managing a 401(k) Advisory Practice
Description:
This presentation offers a detailed explanation of the tools and strategies used to manage overall stock market risk and the tactical asset allocation of both mutual funds and ETFs available in any company retirement plan menu. It also covers 401(k) advice service techniques that include regulatory and fiduciary responsibilities. We will discuss legal, regulatory, and compliance issues related to providing advisory services to qualified plans and plan participants, focusing on both non-fiduciary consulting, fiduciary advisory, and fiduciary management services. We also will cover investment-related topics such as how to provide fiduciary advice regarding plan assets to both the plan and the plan participants, non-fiduciary educational services, and fiduciary investment management services to both the plan and the plan participants.
What's Hot/What's Not in Financial, Estate, and Business Planning
Description:
This session looks at recent efforts to enact financial reform. Mr. Alexander will pull the entire Forum together, using examples from other Forum sessions to illustrate issues of importance to planners. The focus is on a practical approach to new regulations and how they will affect financial, estate, and business planning. Mr. Alexander will provide practical applications to put in perspective the lessons learned during the Forum.
