Be wary of "religious" Financial Advisors...

[skippy740]

Just because someone is in a leadership position in the church DOESN'T mean that everything they do is on the "up and up".

Let the buyer beware!

Just because someone may have a temple recommend doesn't mean that they always have YOUR best interests at heart.

Stuff like this really gets to me. Same thing with Madoff - he started with his Jewish Synagogue and exploited people and it grew from there.

As Reagan has said "Trust, but verify". ESPECIALLY if they are flaunting their religous leadership position as a reason for you to "trust" them.

Rogue advisors on parade

A well-known Utah insurance agent and leader in the Church of Latter Day Saints is going to jail for up to 15 years for defrauding 1,500 investors of roughly $20 million. The agent traded on his position of influence in the church to persuade fellow members to buy promissory notes for development projects. The notes, which purported to pay 10 percent interest in 30 days, were actually part of a long-running Ponzi scheme that fleeced the Mormon faithful of their life’s savings.

[pam]

It also doesn't mean that every financial advisor who is in a leadership position in the Church is unethical or fraudulent as well.

[skippy740]

That's ABSOLUTELY true.

However, it can seem that more people are easily misled once religion is entered into a business transaction.

If religion and church standing should come up, it should be considered a "red flag" with the person being asked to invest. That kind of discussion just isn't appropriate in a business setting.

[UrbanFool]

Do people like this think they can never get caught? How could they not get caught?

Here in our town of 90k, we regularly have women getting caught for embezzling lately. Guess it's the thing.

[Suzie]

I think members should be aware that men are men regardless of their religion. It surprises me the amount of fraud going on in Utah with members of the Church. I think we need to stop being so naive.

[Mahone]

I'm aware of members of the church who are close to me who get involved in dodgy business dealings, that are of extremely questionable legality. This isn't just hearsay, there is evidence of it. I stay out of it however, as it's none of my business. The person I am thinking of in particular has, and current does, hold high standing callings in the church hierarchy. There is only a small group of people within the church who have any inkling of the business this person gets involved in. I'm not aware of this person ever using the church to purposely exploit people, however. It did make me a little more conscious of fact that people will be people, members of the church or not.

[bytor2112]

I work as a Financial Advisor and I avoid church members money. I never want another member to think that I am trying to influence them to do business with me on the basis of our common faith.

[CopenKagan]

Funny that you mention people who have temple recommends.

I don't know what the rules are for discussing the questions you are asked in your interview, so I won't state it. But there is one question that came to mind instantly which would fall under being dishonest with clients for your own personal gain.

[prisonchaplain]

In the broader Christian world there are financial advisors who specifically tout using Christian principles. Larry Burkett is one, Crown Financial Services is another. They tend to be conservative in their strategies, to emphasize getting out of debt, and learning to live within a budget. They might also gently direct towards tithing and missions giving.

Burkett's advice would have cost one a substantial amount in unseen gains during the 90s and into the mids 2000s. However, they would likely have avoided the meltdown as well.

Personally, I find the general counsel of most to diversify to be great. Debt reduction is a huge obvious principle. And, we've taken a small portion of our retirement investments and put them in an ultra-conservative fund that only invests in loans to churches (mortgage and remodeling). It's not backed like a savings account, but has never lost money in over 40 years. Rates are, well, conservative. But, it feels good providing funds for the Kingdom.

BTW, I recently read that the broad market (S&P, Dow, etc.) beats about 80% of investor funds.

[ttribe]

What this thread touches upon is the concept of Affinity Fraud. Several months ago, on another board, I was addressing the issue of Utah having a very high rate of such frauds perpetrated on the population. Here's an excerpt of what I wrote, as it seems to apply here:

Affinity frauds occur because fraudsters are able to exploit a natural sociological phenomenon. Namely, we have a natural tendency to trust people who seem to be "like us" in some way that it important to us and fraud, by its very nature, is a violation of trust.

Affinity scams may run across a variety of different types of sources of human similarity: race, religion, political affiliation, geographic isolation, gender, ethnic origin, family, age group, etc. In the case of Utah, it is my opinion and observation that Utah experiences abnormally high levels of affinity fraud for several reasons, some of which are related to the Church culture:

1 - A significant proportion of the population belongs to the same religion;

2 - The vast majority of the population belongs to the same political party;

3 - The vast majority of the population is a single race;

4 - A significant proportion of the population comes from similar roots (i.e. pioneers) which lends to creation of "reputations" by last name;

5 - Many generations of families tend to remain nearby (these frauds spread like wildfire in families);

6 - Utah communities tend toward a rather "old fashioned" tone whereby being neighborly is a core value. This builds trust.

Are some of these outgrowths of Church culture? Absolutely. The reason you see such high rates on Utah is because it is one of the only places in the U.S. where you have such a concentration of these factors.

A major example of affinity fraud is the Madoff scam and his success amongst New York's Jewish population. I'm not sure anyone would try to argue that there's anything that makes Jews inherently more prone to becoming fraud victims, it's just that affinity frauds prey on groups. It's what they do. These types of frauds are very common in rural southern towns in the U.S. where the demographics are very similar to Utah, for example.

Here are some affinity fraud stories:

http://www.crimes-of-persuasion.com/Crimes/InPerson/MajorPerson/affinity.htm

Affinity Faith-Based Investment Fraud Church Scams

The Fraternal Order Of Fraud Victims

http://www.acfe.com/madoff-case/Chasing-Madoff.pdf

Here are some additional stats on race from 2004 survey performed by the the FTC:

- 11.2 % of the U.S. adult population, or 25 million people, were victims of fraud in the study year;

- 34% of Native Americans and Alaska Natives were victims of fraud;

- 17% of African Americans were victims of fraud;

- 14% of Hispanics were victims of fraud;

- 6% of non-Hispanic whites were victims of fraud.

I don't think there's anything about being Native American that makes an individual a more likely fraud victim other than the fact that they are often part of a tightly-knit group. The fact is ANY tightly-knot group of the population is more likely to be the victims of fraud.

[mightynancy]

I think we need to stop being so naive.

We also need to stop being so evil.