What I'm known for: watching your money every market day

Most people meet their financial adviser exactly once. A plan gets sold, a form gets signed, and then there is silence. The policy goes into a drawer. The fees keep working quietly in the background. And the next time anyone really looks at it is years later, usually because something has already gone wrong.

I'm Lu Jia Jun, a Financial Adviser Representative at Great Eastern Financial Advisers (GEFA) in Singapore. If there is one thing people know me for, it is this. I actually watch your money.

That should be the bare minimum. It isn't. Most money sits unwatched for years. So here is what watching it actually means in my practice.

Checked every market day. Every trading day I look at how your portfolio is sitting and whether any fund has drifted from its target. Not just at the annual review. Not only when you happen to call. Most days nothing needs doing, and we do nothing. That is the point. When something does need attention, I call you, and you decide.

Written rules, not gut feel. The method I run, which I call PEAK, is written down before a single dollar of yours follows it: which funds are in the line-up, when one gets replaced, and when the portfolio goes back to its target mix. When markets get loud, I am not improvising. I am following a plan you can actually read.

Reviewed every quarter. Every quarter I review the funds in the line-up against a written rule. If a fund should change, or your portfolio has drifted from its target mix, I recommend the switch and give you the reason in plain English. Nothing changes until you approve it.

Plain English, from me. When something needs your attention, you hear about it from me. Not a call centre, not a letter you need a dictionary to understand. A person who knows your situation, explaining it in words that make sense.

And I stay. Watching what you hold is the job, long after the paperwork. The whole reason I do this work is a day in 2021 when I could not protect my own family, and a forgotten policy of my father's that had sat unreviewed for years. I decided then that nobody who works with me would ever sit where I sat.

Here is the part worth saying out loud. I cannot promise you returns. Nobody can, and anyone who does is telling you something about themselves, not about your money. All investing carries risk, including the loss of what you put in. What I can promise is that you will always know what is happening with your money, and why. That is what I am known for, and I believe it matters more than any number anyone waves in front of you.

If that is the kind of relationship you have been looking for, the first step is a free, no-pressure review. Nothing gets sold. If you are fine as you are, I will say so.

Jia Jun, Financial Adviser Representative, GEFA. General information only, not financial advice.