Posts Tagged ‘UPIA’
A trustee’s duty to establish return objectives or “Don’t be a lemming”
Duty to Establish a Target Return: Section 2(b) of the Uniform Prudent Investor Act directs, “A trustee’s investment and management decisions… must be evaluated… as a part of an overall investment strategy having risk and return objectives reasonably suited to the trust.” A prudent trustee would not hire an employee without describing at some level…
Read MoreTrustee’s duty to develop an administrative plan or “If you don’t know where you are going you might end up somewhere else.”
Duty to Develop a Plan: Section 2(a) of the UPIA directs, “A trustee shall invest and manage trust assets as a prudent investor would, by considering the purposes, terms, distribution requirements, and other circumstances of the trust.” In response to this duty, a prudent trustee will develop an administrative plan that projects the income and…
Read MoreInvestment Advisor Annual Review (Duty to Monitor)
A trustee has a duty to act prudently when they delegate investment responsibilities to third parties.
Read MoreA Trustee’s Duties when the Portfolio has a Lower Return than Projected
A trustee has a duty to establish return objectives consistent with the trust purposes, terms, distribution requirements and other considerations.
Read MoreAnatomy of a Trustee Lawsuit
Twice in the last 30 days we have gotten calls from attorneys who are representing trustees being sued by disgruntled beneficiaries.
Read MoreThe Trustee’s Compliance Library
Trustees and beneficiaries don’t always see eye-to-eye on issues of trust administration and governance. For the most part, the reasons for these disagreements are divergent beliefs about responsibility, duty, fairness, and transparency. Then the attorneys are called and nobody wins. At the heart of all of these conflicts is a single issue–did the trustee act…
Read MoreA Trustee’s Duty to Independently Monitor Delegates UPIA §9(a)(3)
The Uniform Prudent Investor Act at Section 9(a)(3) directs, “A trustee shall exercise reasonable care, skill and caution by periodically reviewing the agent’s actions in order to monitor the agent’s performance and compliance with the terms of the delegation.” Many trustees implicitly trust the investment advisor to whom they (or their predecessor) delegated investment duties. They…
Read MoreWill ERISA Trustees ever learn? or “I guess they aren't that smart at Princeton”
The Duty: An ERISA trustee is obligated to know who is being paid what by whom and whether the fees being paid are fair and reasonable. This duty is implicit in the trustee’s duty of prudence under C.F.R. §404a-1 and is specifically required by the U.S.C. §1104(a)(1)(A)(ii). The Breach: The ERISA plan trustees at Boeing…
Read MoreWhen to Fire an Investment Advisor
Question: When, if ever, should a business manager recommend that their client fire their investment advisor? Answer: It will be time for your client to part ways with their investment advisor when, over a protracted period of time, the investment advisor has been unable to accomplish the job they were hired to do. The problem…
Read MoreTrust But Verify: Do Private Equity and Hedge Funds Deliver Superior Risk-adjusted Returns?
For several decades, the investment industry has promoted the virtues of hedge funds and private equity funds for large instructional investors and ultra high net worth individuals. But over the last few years these products have come under increased scrutiny because the hoped-for benefits have, for the most part, not materialized. A report in April…
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