With demographic change in the United States, the financial advice industry may finally be coming to the realization that it needs to hire more African-American financial advisors, who are grossly underrepresented in mainstream wealth management. .
Christian Nuwashke is determined to play a major role in promoting it.
Nwashike, 45, is president of the Association of African American Financial Advisors and a former financial advisor who began his career in the 2000s at the former Wachovia Securities, which merged with Wells Fargo Advisors during the financial crisis. Nwasike is currently a principal and executive managing partner of the consulting firm Practice Management Consultants.
The African American Financial Advisors Association, also known as Quad AAAA, is a non-profit organization founded in 2001 focused on increasing the profile of African American financial advisors and advocates for their clients. It is working. The number of black financial advisors in the industry and the number of African American families with financial plans.
At the association’s meeting five years ago, fewer than 100 people attended. The group expects 1,000 industry attendees to gather at its annual meeting in Washington DC this September. Quad AAAA currently has 1,400 dues-paying members who are qualified financial advisors.
investment news He met with Nwashike at a conference in New York in June that focused on recruiting young and potential advisers and implementing management training for experienced advisers. About a dozen major companies attended as sponsors, from Merrill Lynch to Edward Jones.
Investment news: After years of silence, why did the organization choose to highlight its support for black financial advisors at this time?
Christian Nuwashke: We are sleeping giants trying to wake up. An African-American black financial adviser, he turns out to be over 50,000, with the goal of doubling this eventually.
I realized I needed help getting in touch with them. So we asked partners like our new public relations firm to join us and listen. This was his Fall 2022. Now we can publicly talk about the work we are doing to attract new talent and new financial advisors to the industry and work on how to retain that talent.
of: You said the murder of George Floyd inspired the organization’s thinking, right?
CN: Lightning struck after the murder of George Floyd in 2020. I don’t know if he realized he was using counterfeit $20 bills at the store, but then the police were called. If he had come from the majority ethnic group, I am sure what happened that day would not have happened.
It is our duty to use common sense financial planning to support our families and prevent simple mistakes like the murder of George Floyd from happening.
of: What are some examples of the group’s recent advocacy in the industry?
CN: We met with the Securities and Exchange Commission earlier this year, and some financial advisers told the Commission that the investigation was complicated or cumbersome and they didn’t understand the legal language of paperwork. I had the opportunity to speak.
Our members are genuinely passionate about what they do, but due to the specific demographic of clients they work with, many of them don’t have the legal team or resources to do this type of work. Do not have. It’s a one man shop. We strive to make this information simple and actionable for our members.
of: What is the core of your organization’s work?
CN: With 11.7 million African American households, we believe every black family is entitled to a financial plan that serves as a roadmap for their financial future success. Take, for example, Jackson, Mississippi, where we held our winter gathering. There are more than 280,000 black African American households with an average annual income of $35,000 to $46,000 and approximately $6,000 in savings.
Although these households do not fit the client profile of the wealth management industry, many of our advisors are independent or registered investment advisors and are able to work with these households. We reach out directly to communities of color who need help most.
of: What are the annual fees for financial advisors?
CN: $375 a year.
of: Are your advisors generating new customer leads from your organization?
CN: Dating back to 2018, we have a record of approximately 20,000 unique IP address users seeking financial advisors. They are high net worth, high net worth and low income customers and households.
Advisor an average of 2 leads per month. 10% say these leads have helped them transform their business.
of: Some sponsors associated with your association and attending meetings here have been sued by black financial advisors and subsequently accused of racist behavior, including pay disparity and barriers to promotion. I paid millions of dollars to settle with them. How are you currently addressing the history of discrimination in the financial advice industry?
CN: According to BlackRock, African-American Black families will have nearly $6 trillion in wealth by 2021, and we show that data to our partners in the wealth management industry. And while we talk about that, we also talk about how they treat African-American black financial advisors. That means how the policies that companies formulate can sometimes be restrictive. No organization is perfect, but we want to make it better.
