Storm Financial Group

[Solly]

"How CBA deal fuelled Storm's grand delusion"

"A SECRET agreement between Storm Financial founder Emmanuel Cassimatis and Commonwealth Bank greatly increased the investment risks for Storm Financial's customers. But the bank failed to tell them of the risks.

In Brisbane, disenchanted former Storm staff member Ron Jelich, who sold his Redcliffe financial planning business to Storm, referred to the dictionary definition of chimera to explain Storm: ''A fanciful mental illusion or fabrication; a wild and unrealistic dream or idea.


...common CBA practice to make loans to retirees without requiring their signature on any loan application.'


Excellent article by Stuart Washington from The Age is here;

http://business.theage.com.au/business/how-cba-deal-fuelled-storms-grand-delusion-20090904-fbet.html

Maybe living up to their slogan..??

 

[Harleyquin]

What you need to do is learn the basics of prudent investing so you can do it yourself and don't need to go anywhere near investment advisers.
You said you were good at some things. Well, you weren't always good at them were you? You became good at them only after you gathered information and knowledge and then put it into practice.
Investment is pretty much the same. And believe it or not, the knowledge you need is damned easy to get hold of and is really mostly good old common sense. Best of all, it's pretty simple and you don't require a whole lot of it.

The three main investment areas are cash, real estate, and stocks.

For a method of stock market investment that's simple, profitable, and requires no more than one hour of your time each week, read Post No. 2887 on Page 145 of this thread, and also the next few posts after that.
Once you become fully conversant with this methodology you'll have more stock market knowledge and ability than about 95% of people who play the market.
No Storm client would have been wiped out if they'd known and implemented this particular method of investing in stocks. They would have known when to get into the market, when to get out, and how to identify the most suitable stocks. And they wouldn't have needed Manny bloody Cassamatis or any other investment adviser to tell them how to do it.

Real estate.....a bit of common sense and a few bob to get you started are all you need here. Residential real estate in growth areas will increase in value faster than the rate of inflation, and rentals will go up accordingly. Many people have built impressive property portfolios by putting deposits on houses in growth areas, borrowing the balance, and letting their tenants and the tax man meet most of the loan commitments. The amount of money that comes out of your pocket every month can be surprisingly small if you adopt this approach to property investment.
If you can fund the deposit on a house, banks will usually lend you the rest if you show you can meet the loan commitments. You can always utilise fixed rate loans if you're worried about interest rate rises.
The big growth areas in Queensland are the south east corner, Brisbane out to Toowoomba, Bundaberg, Hervey Bay, and various major centres along the central and northern coastline. Rocky, Mackay, Townsville, Cairns, have all experienced strong growth and will do so again, although they've currently slowed down to some extent.
The following link may give you some useful information.
http://www.hotspotting.com.au/

As for cash, well, I think most of us know how to use short term bank products such as term deposits etc, when we're looking for a temporary home for surplus funds.

Hope this helps. I'm not a qualified investment adviser, just an ordinary bloke who's had sufficient interest in investment to do lots of reading and research over the years to come up with a few simple strategies that work.

Thanks Bunyip I've read the posts you've recommended and the book is on my next shopping list. Can't thank you enough. As I find useful info on this site I'm putting it all in one document as a future reference.

 

[Judd]

That is really good, Harleyquin.

If I may make an observation. Stormers were screwed to the wall by following the advice of others and others includes well meaning friends and family.

Same concept could be said for information on this forum. Although it is free and freely given, posters have their own ideas, wants, needs and objectives. These are not yours. You have to develop your own. So sometimes it can be better not to look at what others have achieved but explore and take up those aspects which interest you, discard others with which you are not comfortable and just go your own way. Your finances, money matters and other more important things are between you and your partner, no one else.

Now just go for it - but slowly.

 

[Rainbow]

The submissions were going to the inquiry not SICAG. I have only ever read encouragement from SICAG to submit whatever story. Mine bashes all!!
If you had something different it should be out there.

Maybe you should go back through the posts on the SICAG website then and find the one I'm talking about. It is out there.

 

[Monario]

Carey, I am not sure where you are heading with this idea of advisers selling out before thier clients besides stirring the pot. Most of the advisers (that I know of) not only were sold out with thier clients but most of them ended up with very heavy negative equity as they had loans with CGI. Cant speak for all of them but quite a few did.

Pegasus, I know personally of advisors who had sold out, some had not your right, but mine had. and more had sold either part or all.. Just like manny mine had lies to me about selling, he slipped up at a face to face near the end and outed himself!!

 

[Julia]

That is really good, Harleyquin.

If I may make an observation. Stormers were screwed to the wall by following the advice of others and others includes well meaning friends and family.

Same concept could be said for information on this forum. Although it is free and freely given, posters have their own ideas, wants, needs and objectives. These are not yours. You have to develop your own. So sometimes it can be better not to look at what others have achieved but explore and take up those aspects which interest you, discard others with which you are not comfortable and just go your own way. Your finances, money matters and other more important things are between you and your partner, no one else.

Now just go for it - but slowly.

Judd, you've highlighted a really good principle.

In the case of Bunyip's recommendation, however, reading Weinstein's book is something I think a lot of people on this site would endorse. For me, at least, it was like someone turning a light on.

Harleyquin will probably first want to understand how a stock market works and hopefully she'll take advantage of the ASX's education section.

 

[Garpal Gumnut]

Thanks Bunyip I've read the posts you've recommended and the book is on my next shopping list. Can't thank you enough. As I find useful info on this site I'm putting it all in one document as a future reference.

That is really good, Harleyquin.

If I may make an observation. Stormers were screwed to the wall by following the advice of others and others includes well meaning friends and family.

Same concept could be said for information on this forum. Although it is free and freely given, posters have their own ideas, wants, needs and objectives. These are not yours. You have to develop your own. So sometimes it can be better not to look at what others have achieved but explore and take up those aspects which interest you, discard others with which you are not comfortable and just go your own way. Your finances, money matters and other more important things are between you and your partner, no one else.

Now just go for it - but slowly.

Judd, you've highlighted a really good principle.

In the case of Bunyip's recommendation, however, reading Weinstein's book is something I think a lot of people on this site would endorse. For me, at least, it was like someone turning a light on.

Harleyquin will probably first want to understand how a stock market works and hopefully she'll take advantage of the ASX's education section.

I reckon that you Harleyquin should start a thread called Harleyquin.

You have a good attitude and you could chronicle your recovery using as much assets of knowledge from asf as possible to become self sufficient again.

gg

 

[chrisgee]

ok its been another very very busy week again-i tried to keep up with wahts been happening and my head is spinning-i cant believe that mr c said that stomers were told that they could lose the house if things went bad-what a load of bullshait-id like to use another word but im sure id get banned-the
exact opposite was told-if anything went bad they would bail you out-were any other stormers told by this mob you could end up losing the house???
gee this makes me so so mad-they siad they woulld look after you-there is NOTHING to worry about-its all in hand-what about the CB freaking A-they changed the policy of advising margining calls in 2003-was anybody told?-come on mr megabucks norris show some b*lls on this-id like to get mr norris and mr c in front of judge judy on one of her bad attitude days and rip into both of them and make them come back with some real answers-not the waffle we heard at the enquiry from mr c and not the ducking and weaving we heard from the CB freaking A. im not a smart ar*e shinny bum i real worker- how about some justice-end of weekly rant-!!!!!!!

 

[Judd]

ok its been another very very busy week again-i tried to keep up with wahts been happening and my head is spinning-i cant believe that mr c said that stomers were told that they could lose the house if things went bad-what a load of bullshait-id like to use another word but im sure id get banned-the
exact opposite was told-if anything went bad they would bail you out-were any other stormers told by this mob you could end up losing the house???
gee this makes me so so mad-they siad they woulld look after you-there is NOTHING to worry about-its all in hand-what about the CB freaking A-they changed the policy of advising margining calls in 2003-was anybody told?-come on mr megabucks norris show some b*lls on this-id like to get mr norris and mr c in front of judge judy on one of her bad attitude days and rip into both of them and make them come back with some real answers-not the waffle we heard at the enquiry from mr c and not the ducking and weaving we heard from the CB freaking A. im not a smart ar*e shinny bum i real worker- how about some justice-end of weekly rant-!!!!!!!

Good rant, chrisgee. Keep it going as it can be cathartic. I'm serious.

Just bear in mind that Mr Norris was not the CEO of CB-[expletive deleted]-A in 2003 so you maybe aiming at the wrong person. He is picking up the reins on legacy issues which did not occur, presumably, on his watch. It is what CB-[expletive deleted]-A does now to correct those wrongs which is the important part.

 

[Garpal Gumnut]

ok its been another very very busy week again-i tried to keep up with wahts been happening and my head is spinning-i cant believe that mr c said that stomers were told that they could lose the house if things went bad-what a load of bullshait-id like to use another word but im sure id get banned-the
exact opposite was told-if anything went bad they would bail you out-were any other stormers told by this mob you could end up losing the house???
gee this makes me so so mad-they siad they woulld look after you-there is NOTHING to worry about-its all in hand-what about the CB freaking A-they changed the policy of advising margining calls in 2003-was anybody told?-come on mr megabucks norris show some b*lls on this-id like to get mr norris and mr c in front of judge judy on one of her bad attitude days and rip into both of them and make them come back with some real answers-not the waffle we heard at the enquiry from mr c and not the ducking and weaving we heard from the CB freaking A. im not a smart ar*e shinny bum i real worker- how about some justice-end of weekly rant-!!!!!!!

That was no rant mate.

A good summary.

Hang in mate, your day is coming.

gg

 

[DocK]

Thanks Bunyip I've read the posts you've recommended and the book is on my next shopping list. Can't thank you enough. As I find useful info on this site I'm putting it all in one document as a future reference.

I just picked up a copy I'd ordered from my local library - I'm expecting big things after the reviews it's been getting

Real estate.....a bit of common sense and a few bob to get you started are all you need here. Residential real estate in growth areas will increase in value faster than the rate of inflation, and rentals will go up accordingly. Many people have built impressive property portfolios by putting deposits on houses in growth areas, borrowing the balance, and letting their tenants and the tax man meet most of the loan commitments. The amount of money that comes out of your pocket every month can be surprisingly small if you adopt this approach to property investment.
If you can fund the deposit on a house, banks will usually lend you the rest if you show you can meet the loan commitments. You can always utilise fixed rate loans if you're worried about interest rate rises.
The big growth areas in Queensland are the south east corner, Brisbane out to Toowoomba, Bundaberg, Hervey Bay, and various major centres along the central and northern coastline. Rocky, Mackay, Townsville, Cairns, have all experienced strong growth and will do so again, although they've currently slowed down to some extent.
The following link may give you some useful information.
http://www.hotspotting.com.au/

Thanks for this post Bunyip, If you happen to have any other interesting sites for realestate please post them, as I am focusing some attention in this area now, as in the past, under storms advice, I did not.

Sometimes I think the only good decision we made when it came to all things storm, was to ignore their advice to sell the factory owned by our smsf and put the money into the market. We bought the factory about 5 years ago and our business rents it from our smsf - by far the best financial decision we've ever made. If I ever have enough spare cash for a deposit on property investment I think I'd go for commercial property again. Guess it depends where though.

...I'd like to get mr norris and mr c in front of judge judy on one of her bad attitude days and rip into both of them and make them come back with some real answers-not the waffle we heard at the enquiry from mr c and not the ducking and weaving we heard from the CB freaking A. im not a smart ar*e shinny bum i real worker- how about some justice-end of weekly rant-!!!!!!!

What a very excellent idea chrisgee - would rate its backside off!

 

[Harleyquin]

I just picked up a copy I'd ordered from my local library - I'm expecting big things after the reviews it's been getting

Sometimes I think the only good decision we made when it came to all things storm, was to ignore their advice to sell the factory owned by our smsf and put the money into the market. We bought the factory about 5 years ago and our business rents it from our smsf - by far the best financial decision we've ever made. If I ever have enough spare cash for a deposit on property investment I think I'd go for commercial property again. Guess it depends where though.

What a very excellent idea chrisgee - would rate its backside off!

I agree with you Chrisgee. It looks like the inquiry is pressing the CBA for more answers. We are all getting extremely tired of the storm issue which should never have been allowed to reach this point. Many of us have spent the last six to eight months trying desperately to try and work out exactly where it all went wrong.

Let's hope the inquiry can find out exactly what did happen. In our case we thought we were going to a decent financial planner and were not aware that we had to understand and monitor everything, thought that's what we were paying them for -OK we made a mistake. Now all we want to know is 'Exactly why did it go so horribly wrong and who is to blame for destroying us financially and emotionally.'

 

[Monario]

I agree with you Chrisgee. It looks like the inquiry is pressing the CBA for more answers. We are all getting extremely tired of the storm issue which should never have been allowed to reach this point. Many of us have spent the last six to eight months trying desperately to try and work out exactly where it all went wrong.

Let's hope the inquiry can find out exactly what did happen. In our case we thought we were going to a decent financial planner and were not aware that we had to understand and monitor everything, thought that's what we were paying them for -OK we made a mistake. Now all we want to know is 'Exactly why did it go so horribly wrong and who is to blame for destroying us financially and emotionally.'

Yes Halrey. we are all wondering the same, Many people in the public, and here on ASF have the view that WE are the ones responsible, and although I do feel some responsibility for letting it go so far, I definately do not feel as though we are at the top of the food chain in blame on this one...

As you stated, and everyone knows, we were paying top dollar to have them manage our investment, and on many occasions, the words, DONT WORRY we know best and that is why you are paying for us to look after your... blah blah... you know how it goes...

So with that I say, if FP's can absolve themselves of all responsibility when things go t1ts up, than i think governments should have a look if this form of business should be allowed to continue..

And as I have said before, if it is, I will be off to get my FP licence...

 

[Joe Blow]

Ladies and gentlemen, I am urging you all to please be very careful when using the QUOTE tags. Some posting in this thread have been messing them up of late and in some instances it looks like they are attributing the words of one poster to another. This is something I do not wish to occur for obvious reasons.

If you do not understand how the QUOTE tags work please read this thread: https://www.aussiestockforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2737

It is actually very simple and to ensure that you get it right, please consider using the 'Preview Post' button (next to 'Submit Reply') before submitting your post, so you can review it thoroughly first. Please be aware that an 'Edit' button appears on your post for 20 minutes after you do submit it, so there really is no excuse for not ensuring that your post is formatted correctly.

 

[Garpal Gumnut]

I agree with you Chrisgee. It looks like the inquiry is pressing the CBA for more answers. We are all getting extremely tired of the storm issue which should never have been allowed to reach this point. Many of us have spent the last six to eight months trying desperately to try and work out exactly where it all went wrong.

Let's hope the inquiry can find out exactly what did happen. In our case we thought we were going to a decent financial planner and were not aware that we had to understand and monitor everything, thought that's what we were paying them for -OK we made a mistake. Now all we want to know is 'Exactly why did it go so horribly wrong and who is to blame for destroying us financially and emotionally.'

Yes Halrey. we are all wondering the same, Many people in the public, and here on ASF have the view that WE are the ones responsible, and although I do feel some responsibility for letting it go so far, I definately do not feel as though we are at the top of the food chain in blame on this one...

As you stated, and everyone knows, we were paying top dollar to have them manage our investment, and on many occasions, the words, DONT WORRY we know best and that is why you are paying for us to look after your... blah blah... you know how it goes...

So with that I say, if FP's can absolve themselves of all responsibility when things go t1ts up, than i think governments should have a look if this form of business should be allowed to continue..

And as I have said before, if it is, I will be off to get my FP licence...

Thanks guys and gals.

My hope would be that FInancial Planners would cease to exist.

I feel financial management should be introduced in primary school and that it should be a required subject for an OP score in high school.

It is just as important as Maths and English.

With some exeptions such as Carey and other shining lights who should cater for rich people playing in a bigger game, the ordinary Jo Blow ( excuse me Joe , not you) should be able to plan his or her investments, super and inflows and outflows as well as any financial planner.

So Bernie Ripoll, I know you read ASF, (our spies are everywhere,) be a different politician and ban the FP manque type old Nat Mutual leeches and educate our youth about finances.

gg

 

[maccka]

I feel financial management should be introduced in primary school and that it should be a required subject for an OP score in high school.

It is just as important as Maths and English.

Hmmm - as a teacher I have a real dilemma when people say stuff like this. I heard it at the inquiry on Thursday and instantly had a very negative reaction to it. At the same time I understand what people are trying to suggest.

This is why the negative jumps out..
1 - If many people in the financial industries cannot educate themselves properly (as seems evidenced by the lack of qualifications attached to being a financial advisor) or others (as seems evidenced by the extensive education plan that SF clients thought they were getting) what makes you think that primary and secondary teachers would do better?
2 - How deeply would you expect a primary or secondary student to learn aspects of financial management?
3 - What is currently in the curriculum of our students that you believe should be thrown out in order to fit the financial management curriculum?
4 - Are you aware of what aspects of finances are already included in the curricula (primary and secondary) around the nation? You might actually be quite surprised to see what is actually there. It is not all in maths by the way.
5 - There are aspects of financial management (eg superannuation) that most students wouldn't learn (even if it was in the curriculum) as it is not relevant enough to their world at the point in time that the learning is occurring.
6 - Learning in the 21st century is about life long skills. (This is a point that non-educators may find challenging and are likely to criticize loudly as they don't have the understanding of current educational philosophies) If too much emphasis on financial knowledge is placed on school curricula we run the risk of teaching our students information that will be obsolete within 2 - 3 years (even less). Students need to learn how to be flexible with their learning and find answers that are relevant to their context at the time they are learning. We need to develop our primary and secondary school students as people who recognise that information changes rapidly and learn at all times in their life.

On the other hand...
I definitely see why people want to add it. A lot of it is about trying to give students some understanding of finances before they leave school.

It was brought up by representatives of the Australian Investors Association in Brisbane on Thursday. Senator McLucas was very quick to point out why it really is not a valid option. I would suggest you might like to read the Hansard when it comes out to get your own understanding of what she said.

All too often I hear people use school as the fix-up for society's problems and so have an almost inbuilt cringe mechanism when people suggest putting yet another thing in a very overcrowded curriculum.

Cheers
Maccka

 

[Solly]

"Legal tussle over Storm documents"

"PEOPLE involved in Storm Financial's collapse, including the founder, Emmanuel Cassimatis, may face further action over the collapse of the financial planning group, legal manoeuvring at a parliamentary committee hearing suggested last week.

Mr Cassimatis told the committee he had gathered documents and asked for permission to table them.

Tabling documents before a parliamentary committee means they gain the protection of parliamentary privilege"

More by Stuart Washington in the SMH here;

http://business.smh.com.au/business/legal-tussle-over-storm-documents-20090906-fcss.html

 

[Julia]

Hmmm - as a teacher I have a real dilemma when people say stuff like this. I heard it at the inquiry on Thursday and instantly had a very negative reaction to it. At the same time I understand what people are trying to suggest.

This is why the negative jumps out..
1 - If many people in the financial industries cannot educate themselves properly (as seems evidenced by the lack of qualifications attached to being a financial advisor) or others (as seems evidenced by the extensive education plan that SF clients thought they were getting) what makes you think that primary and secondary teachers would do better?
2 - How deeply would you expect a primary or secondary student to learn aspects of financial management?
3 - What is currently in the curriculum of our students that you believe should be thrown out in order to fit the financial management curriculum?
4 - Are you aware of what aspects of finances are already included in the curricula (primary and secondary) around the nation? You might actually be quite surprised to see what is actually there. It is not all in maths by the way.
5 - There are aspects of financial management (eg superannuation) that most students wouldn't learn (even if it was in the curriculum) as it is not relevant enough to their world at the point in time that the learning is occurring.
6 - Learning in the 21st century is about life long skills. (This is a point that non-educators may find challenging and are likely to criticize loudly as they don't have the understanding of current educational philosophies) If too much emphasis on financial knowledge is placed on school curricula we run the risk of teaching our students information that will be obsolete within 2 - 3 years (even less). Students need to learn how to be flexible with their learning and find answers that are relevant to their context at the time they are learning. We need to develop our primary and secondary school students as people who recognise that information changes rapidly and learn at all times in their life.

On the other hand...
I definitely see why people want to add it. A lot of it is about trying to give students some understanding of finances before they leave school.

It was brought up by representatives of the Australian Investors Association in Brisbane on Thursday. Senator McLucas was very quick to point out why it really is not a valid option. I would suggest you might like to read the Hansard when it comes out to get your own understanding of what she said.

All too often I hear people use school as the fix-up for society's problems and so have an almost inbuilt cringe mechanism when people suggest putting yet another thing in a very overcrowded curriculum.

Cheers
Maccka

Top post, Maccka. The level of financial information offered seems to vary by school. The high school where I mentor students has basic financial management included in its accounting option but this was a programme designed by the individual teacher and not part of the Qld Education curriculum. This teacher also arranged for outside people to come in and talk to her students about the sharemarket during the time they played the Sharemarket Game on the ASX

On the other hand, we offered a series of financial management workshops to the same school as part of the Youth Mentoring Programme and received zilch interest from the school.

As you suggest, the curriculum is already overcrowded, teachers are having to deal with unprecedented behaviour issues amongst students, and I'm quite over hearing people suggest that 'schools should teach A, B, C, and D. etc'
It's about time parents took a bit more of the responsibility that should be regarded theirs rather than the school's. All too often, however, the parents haven't a clue themselves.

 

[cuttlefish]

Even the most basic of financial education could be taught in schools and would benefit people.

* Live within your means (spend less than you earn)
* Invest the difference in appreciating assets
* Whereever possible, only use debt to invest in assets that return an income and are likely to appreciate in value.
* Whereever possible, don't go into debt to purchase items that don't generate an income and are likely to depreciate in value
* Appreciate what you have and don't put yourself into debt to buy things that you can't afford and don't need.

There's still a LOT of people that think their first car is their first big investment and think its a good idea to spend a lot of money on their first sofa because if they buy quality the first time around they won't need to buy another one for a long time (I'm serious - there really are people out there that think like this).

 

[Harleyquin]

GG you never said a truer word there. Financial management, I like that term far better than financial planning. I would like to see Financial Planning made illegal in this country. I expect many to disagree with me however I care not. If financial management - all aspects of investing including the share market- were taught in schools we would have no need for these so called experts who are the only profession that I'm aware of who don't take any professional responsibility of their advice.

How many of you out there have read some expert or other say -
'Go to a licensed financial planner and take their advice'?

You don't have to look far, go to the ASIC website for your first port of call. We have found out the hard way that what they really mean is -

'Go to a financial planner and seek their advice but before you decide whether to take it or not make sure that you educate yourself sufficiently to understand exactly what they mean and what the risks are and if there is anything that you don't understand you then have two choices.

1.-Don't take their advice OR

2. -if you do choose to take their advice they will give you no guarantees and don't expect them or anyone else to monitor any of your investments, that's your job, and it will cost you a mint for this advice, and more importantly be prepared to lose everything. Your financial planner will give you a legal document to sign get it checked over by at least two lawyers, two accountants and two other financial planners to make sure you/they don't miss anything. As they will not guarantee their work like other professions PLEASE ONLY PROCEED WITH CAUTION

We took the first advice but now, only after the storm has hit, have we been told that the second advice is closer to the truth. If I ever see the first advice anywhere again I will start spitting chips.

This statement no longer reflects the truth for the financially naive.