Profit from advantages unlike any other financial partner
How do you define a successful partnership? At GuidedChoice, we believe it begins with four core principles: flexibility, innovation, trust and fairness. It’s a philosophy that guides exactly how we invest in the success of our clients and colleagues. Every single aspect tailored to the specific goals you want to achieve. So you can help each participant achieve the future they want with greater certainty and confidence.
GuidedChoice was founded to provide unmatched customization at the plan level, while offering participants truly personalized advice based on their individual retirement goals. The result is exceptional time and cost savings for the plan or advisor, without having to sacrifice control. Key benefits include:
Funds tailored to any strategy:
An open architecture that allows us to take almost any universe of fund or fund families to create portfolios that are customized to the plan or advisor’s investment strategy, and work for the diverse employee base of a given client
Custom Fund Menu based on your strategy:
Advisors and plan sponsors can choose their own fund menu, provided they satisfy our asset class quotas
More Fund Flexibility for More Control:
No restriction to a specific or single fund family for any GuidedChoice solution, including our personalized TDF
Proprietary Model that Adapts to Your Plan:
Via our proprietary model, the unique ability to work within your plan strategy and fund options to determine asset allocations along the efficient frontier that provide the highest level of expected return at different levels of risk
Modular Capabilities for Sophisticated Customization
Modular capabilities that allow for easy customization to multiple plan rules and scenarios, plus a proprietary plan rules engine that allows for seamless automatic updates to plan rules and changes
Customized Portfolio for Each Participant:
Via our Managed Solutions, the ability to provide each participant a customized portfolio — fully personalized to them
GuidedChoice has spent years implementing a proprietary application of Modern Portfolio Theory (MPT) that is more intelligent than simply generating an efficient frontier. We employed best practices in designing our methodology. Under the guidance of our Chief Architect and MPT creator Dr. Harry Markowitz, features of our methodology include:
An Advanced Return Model That Mirrors Reality – Not Just a Textbook
An advanced return model that is consistent with how asset returns behave in the real world, not in a textbook, and flexible enough to let us add new asset classes over time. Our model informs thousands of Monte Carlo simulations of possible future interest rates, bond yields, and rates of inflation and asset class returns, which tell us how your retirement savings can evolve.
Constraints That Go Beyond Asset Class Weights to Better Balance Risk and Reward
Constraints on both assets class weights and portfolio risk. Constraining asset class weights assures portfolios remain well diversified. Constraining portfolio risk means we won’t recommend an allocation too risky for its expected reward.
Chart above is illustrative only
Drawbacks to using efficient frontiers without understanding them
- Red zone: lottery tickets
- Too little reward for the risk
We recommend allocations in the green region where geometric return is rising
A Proprietary Utility Model That Helps Guard Investors Against Bad Outcomes
An initial risk level recommendation for each client based on our proprietary utility model, Bi-Constant Relative Risk Aversion (BI-CRRA). We designed our BI-CRRA model to represent a typical retirement saver’s strong desire to avoid bad outcomes. After receiving our recommendation, clients can use our online tools to adjust their savings rate, risk level, and retirement date, and see how their decisions can affect their range of possible outcomes.
Use of Simulations to Create More Realistic Projections
Use of simulations instead of calculations to create realistic projections of future retirement wealth and income. No one knows exactly what the future holds, so any exact calculation will be wrong. By projecting future asset class and portfolio returns one month at a time over several decades, we can better estimate and communicate the full range of a client’s possible retirement income than if we simply used a single calculation.
Investment Team Oversight Made of Some of the Best Minds in the Industry
Oversight from an expert investment team, headed up by Dr. Harry Markowitz himself, that meets on a weekly basis. In addition to reviewing ongoing performance of existing recommended portfolios, the team discusses modeling and improvements to our engine. Our decades of collective investment experience offer a rich background for solving different problems relating to retirement saving and spending. Informed but not dogmatic, we take considerable care when researching topics so you can be fully confident in the advice we provide.
Additional Applications for Retirement Income Planning include:
Tax Smoothing and Conservative Planning to Create a More Confident Plan
Application of the same powerful methodologies to offer Retirement Income Planning, with the addition of tax smoothing and conservative treatment of mortality risk to further ensure clients’ money lasts throughout their lifetime. By simulating household spending until well past a client’s expected lifespan, we can help them to better identify sustainable spending levels aligned with their goals.
GuidedChoice has always been a fully independent company that strictly works in the best interests of our clients and partners. Led by our founder and industry pioneer Sherrie Grabot, we hold ourselves to the highest ethical standard, which includes:
- No parent company, or affiliations with an investment manager or venture capital firm
- No hidden relationships or conflicts of interest
- No payments for recommending an investment
- All advice is objective, unbiased and tailored to the specific goals of plan and participant
- An open door policy that invites every client and partner to discuss how we can better provide the flexibility, support and service they need to be successful
GuidedChoice was founded on the idea of providing financial freedom to all. In addition to ensuring that we have solutions for clients and partners of any size, our pricing policy is carefully structured to make our services more affordable for all.
We also strive for greater transparency, which means we clearly explain to participants the benefits they receive, diligently avoid hidden fees, offer flat pricing wherever possible, or cap our fees at a certain account balance — so the participant always knows that once they reach that balance, they’ll never pay more.
