Five Star Quality Rating

Paladin uses a proprietary methodology to rate the quality of financial advisor credentials, ethics, and business practices one to five stars. Paladin only profiles five star rated advisors in the Registry.

Paladin ratings are based on data that are submitted by advisors. We validate the accuracy of certain data if advisors subscribe to Paladin's Financial Advisor Due Diligence (FADD) service. If advisors do not subscribe to the FADD service Paladin publishes data as submitted by advisors.

Paladin's five star quality rating and FADD service do not constitute an endorsement, recommendation, guarantee, or favoring by Paladin of any advisor and do not constitute a claim by Paladin, whether explicit or implicit, that advisor credentials, ethics, business practices, products, services, opinions, advice, recommendations, or claims are reputable, honest, competent, or will result in exceptional financial returns. Investors are solely responsible for advisor selection decisions that may be based on information that is published in the Paladin Registry. Investors are encouraged to request additional, current information from advisors that validates their competence, ethics, business practices, and services.

Who are the Real Financial Experts?

Every financial advisor in America claims to be an investment expert. They do not provide any type of track record that documents this claim. In the absence of documentation, these advisors know you have no way to invalidate their claims so they are free to make sales pitches that are designed to convince you they are real experts.

Less ethical advisors use sophisticated sales pitches to make unsubstantiated claims that are designed to win your trust and gain control of your assets. Many of their claims are misrepresentation which is prohibited by securities industry regulations. However, the regulatory agencies have no real power when the information is provided to you in sales pitches. Verbal information is easy for advisors to deny when it is your word against theirs.

Some of the more popular claims and sales tactics that are used by unscrupulous advisors include:

I am a licensed investment expert
You can trust me, I am a licensed professional
I can deliver high returns for low risk
Your goals always come first
I can identify high performing investments before the performance occurs
You can call my references. They will confirm I am an expert

You should disregard all of these sales claims including references who may be friends of the advisors and have been coached to make positive comments. Verbal sales claims are worthless. What you want is documentation that proves the advisors are real experts. This information includes: