Remember Our Heroes is on cruise control now. Wade is happy with the current size and scope of the program, and he's got enough things on his plate in the near term to occupy his energies. Wade plans to semi-retire at 49, and until then he's focused on completing a five-year goal to expand his business roughly eightfold, to $1 billion. That's a long way from the time more than 20 years ago when a successful investment in MTV stock sparked his interest in the financial profession.
As a senior majoring in broadcast journalism at Ball State University in Indiana, Wade realized his degree would likely lead to a series of low-profile, low-paying jobs in Podunk markets. He decided to combine his major and prior sales experience into a job selling audio equipment, and he started out selling wireless microphones for Telex Communications in the Twin Cities area. He eventually became a national sales manager.
During the early 1980s, a $3,500 investment in MTV stock (now owned by Viacom) turned into $12,000, and Wade thought he had the golden touch. Looking for new challenges, he left Telex and was hired as a financial planner at IDS Financial Advisors (now part of American Express). He became one of the firm's top planners in the Twin Cities, but left after ten years to start his own firm in 1994.
Wade Financial Group now has 130 clients, whose average net worth is $3 million. Increasingly, Wade has become a vocal critic of the mutual fund industry, particularly regarding fees. As such, he's become a big proponent of exchange-traded funds that mirror market indexes, trade like stocks and carry very low management fees. "I'm on a big mission in the next four years to educate the public on the pros and cons of mutual funds, with the emphasis on the cons," says Wade. Part of that mission entails talking about alternatives such as ETFs and Folios.
Folios enable investors to create and manage their own basket of individual stocks in a personalized portfolio that provides the diversification of a mutual fund with the control and flexibility of stock ownership. In September, Wade Financial Group launched WadeFolios.com to promote the Folios investment strategy based on a platform the company developed.
Folios were seen as the next big thing when they hit the scene in 2000, but haven't quite found their niche yet. The concept was developed by Foliofn Inc., a Vienna, Va.-based company that serves as one of the two custodians for WadeFolios.com. Wade believes his system, which uses independent research to create portfolios with a growth and income bent, will boost the profile of the Folio strategy. "We'll be the leader in packaging Folios in a way that makes it as easy for individual investors to buy as mutual funds are," he says.
Also in September, Wade began hosting a local radio show and his company launched a second Web site, Fundpolice.com, aimed at keeping track of mutual fund scandals and other funds-related news.
Some clients expressed concern that Wade is spreading himself thin regarding his main mission-overseeing their portfolios. "I told them we've essentially doubled our staff size during the past year to improve client management, and that all of these new divisions will be separately staffed," says Wade.
Meanwhile, Wade will continue to take a day or two off around Veterans Day and Memorial Day to get people like Henry Flesh and his fellow veterans in front of school children.