Cutting Through the Noise
March 12, 2012
We are currently seeking candidates for a permanent, full-time operations position. As part of the role, the team member will process account applications and trade documents, manage the account transfer process, reconcile daily valuations, and take...
Read MoreDecember 10, 2010
We've compiled four years of Tom's articles and blogs into a new book titled It's Not Rocket Science: Plain-English Advice for Managing Your Investments. The pieces are short narratives that reinforce some of the basic, yet most important, principles of investing...
Read MoreNovember 4, 2010
As I outlined in an earlier post, we feel that our fee reduction program is unique in rewarding clients who entrust more of their money with us, and who keep it with us for an extended time. In this posting, I’ll delve in to some of the gory details of how we...
Read MoreJune 23, 2010
Last week I published our deliberations on whether to launch a client referral program. We had good response via the blog’s comments, email, and in person. In part this was because we asked for feedback, and in part it was because our clients were...
Read MoreJune 14, 2010
Everyone in the investment industry knows that summer is a slow time for opening new accounts. It's a given that we should accept that investors go on holiday and the last thing they want to think about is retirement planning, let alone the perceived headache...
Read MoreJuly 6, 2008
I've long had an interest in formal business rules specifications and systems for managing enterprise business rules. Despite seeing the value in managing business rules explicitly, I've never been able to see how relatively small organizations like Steadyhand would have the ...
Read MoreApril 16, 2008
Vancouver, April 16, 2008 - Steadyhand Investment Funds is proud to announce that they are the recipient of two Lippy Awards. The prestigious awards are presented for excellence in the fields of mutual fund performance and marketing. The firm is particularly ...
Read MoreMarch 31, 2008
One of our promises to our clients is that we will reduce or eliminate paper mailings. Unfortunately we have to deliver tax documents (contribution receipts and T3's) to our clients via paper. The problem is that each of our mutual funds ...
Read MoreFebruary 18, 2008
Jonathan Chevreau of the Financial Post interviews Tom about Steadyhand (part 1) and five myths of investing (part 2). See the videos here . ...
Read MoreJanuary 14, 2008
I've been following the rise in self-publishing and book publishing on demand (POD). One of the leaders in the field is lulu.com , who allow you to publish hardcopy books in quantities as little as one. Just for fun, we selected ...
Read MoreJanuary 2, 2008
The funds paid out management fee rebate distributions and year-end distributions on Dec 27th and 31st respectively, so distributions have been on my mind lately. As we went through the distribution process, I made a number of notes. A lot ...
Read MoreDecember 28, 2007
I've finally gotten around to reading William Bernstein's popular 'The Four Pillars of Investing', first published in 2002 by McGraw-Hill. As the title suggests, Bernstein approaches understanding investing via four broad themes: Theory - emphasizes that investment returns are primarily a ...
Read MoreDecember 17, 2007
Many of our readers are not familiar with blogs and RSS. This short video provides an introduction to these technologies. Using an RSS reader can be a more efficient way to read our blog. ...
Read MoreNovember 25, 2007
Canadian Capitalist first brought Vitaliy Katsenelson's Active Value Investing to my attention in this posting . Katsenelson believes that we are in a range-bound market, defined as a market that goes up and down, but ultimately ends up back where ...
Read MoreNovember 14, 2007
We've just created a Steadyhand page on Facebook, available here (you'll have to sign up for a free Facebook membership if you don't already have one). Frankly at this stage it is an experiment, but we're inspired in part by ...
Read MoreJuly 12, 2007
We're proud of our first version of client statements, in particular the portfolio summary page at the beginning of every statement. The first attached image is for a fictitious client, Jim Smith, who has three accounts: an Investment account, RSP ...
Read MoreJuly 12, 2007
[update: As of November 2009, our performance calculation methodology changed. Individual account performance is still calculated using the time weighted rate of return (daily valuation); however, it is now calculated in our wealth management platform, rather than the recordkeeping system. ...
Read MoreApril 30, 2007
Early on in our business design, we decided to outsource many of the business functions necessary in a mutual fund company. One of the tools we used to visualize how the functions would fit together was a (very loose) variation ...
Read MoreMarch 3, 2007
One of our differentiators is our fee reduction program. In this and subsequent postings, I'll outline the design and implementation of the program. Philosophy and Objectives Our costs for managing a $10,000 account and a $150,000 account are not that ...
Read MoreFebruary 18, 2007
One of my intentions for this blog is to expose some of the inner workings of Steadyhand, including the functions we outsource and the vendors we work with. A natural place to start is with this website and the firm ...
Read MoreFebruary 13, 2007
Here's a shot of our Manager of Research & Communications, Scott Ronalds, recovering from our last MFDA site visit in January. ...
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