Date:    04/12/2000  6:58 PM
Subject: Attn: Arthur Levitt re: Proposed Merrill Lynch Rule
 
Dear Mr. Levitt:
     
I will most appreciate your efforts to oppose the proposed "Merrill Lynch 
rule" that would establish a two-tiered, double disclosure standard for those 
of us purporting to seek the trust and confidence of our clients, namely 
financial advisors whether those of us who are independent investment advisors 
or those working in the so-called wirehouses.  As far as a consumer is 
concerned, I suggest they are looking for expertise, sensitivety, 
understanding and service to their best interests from those supplicants 
seeking the job of being her financial advisor.  I suggest she is entitled to 
make this search with standards of disclosure that do not vary based on the 
identity of the supplicant's primary employer.
     
This is an issue that goes to the core of our country as well as the 
financial services industry.  As life spans increase along with our 
citizenry's dependence upon their intangible financial assets, folks must 
invest.  Likewise most must trust in others.  Simply put, most individuals do 
not have both the skills or confidence to invest solely on their own but will 
rely upon advisors to help them.  Without the sort of information that can 
help them understand what some of the right questions might be for those they 
would hope to trust, these trusting folks are vulnerable to highly evolved 
sales tactics and manipulation.  Their personal financial security is at risk 
and their quality of life along with it. 
     
Granted, in an imperfect world, consumers cannot be assured that those upon 
whom they rely have the insights to the future that will guarantee rapidly 
growing portfolios.  But, at the very least, they should be able to 
understand if their advisors fall a bit short of being fiduciaries, if they 
might not have access to the resources of a major institution, if there is a 
possibility they might be more salespersons than advisors or if their primary 
loyalties have the possibility of being to an entity other than the client. 
Disclosure cuts all ways, but there is simply no earthly reason consumers of 
financial advisory services should not be able to source enough information 
to fully understand how their advisors get paid or that they should not have 
sufficient access to information to enable the reasonably inquisitive to 
understand the financial incentives inherent to their advisory relationships. 
     
     
Indeed, the worst case scenario is the one proposed: that they could be 
confused by different disclosure standards for different sources of 
advice--particularly where they concern their advisor's primary loyalties and 
motivations. 
     
I am not suggesting penalizing honest businesses.  I am suggesting that the 
consumer has a right to know what can be objectively and nonobtrusively known 
about those who would seek to advise them.  I also suggest that those of us 
seeking the position of trusted advisor have an obligation to fully disclose 
the nature of our businesses and compensation and to provide simple tools for 
reasonable inquiry.
     
There is no reason all of us in financial service businesses should not 
provide the same sorts of information to consumers where the nature of advice 
and assistance being sought is precisely of the same nature and kind.  
     
This is important.
     
Respectfully submitted,
     
Richard B. Wagner, JD, CFP
Principal, WorthLiving, LLC
Past President of the Institute of Certified Financial Planners