SEC initiatives that could affect financial advisors

On April 12, 2018, our chief compliance officer (CCO), Ms. Manal Fouz, attended the Compliance Outreach Program in Washington, D.C., sponsored by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The conference is designed to promote better communication between securities regulators and compliance officers. A limited number of CCOs from registered investment advisory firms nationwide are approved by the SEC to attend in person, while others can watch online. Here are 3 take-aways you may be interested in: 1) Continued focus on older clients and protecting them from financial exploitation The SEC continues to focus on how firms deal with their older clients and those who demonstrate diminished mental capacity. Sadly, most financial exploitation cases involving older clients is perpetrated by family members. At Azzad, we’ve already implemented a few best practices mentioned during the conference. They include allowing you to assign a trusted contact on your account. A trusted contact is someone we can talk to in case we can’t reach you or want to confirm your requests. Your trusted contact won’t be able to conduct actual transactions with your accounts, so a power of attorney (POA) is best for those cases. You can expect more questions from us if