Some advisors retire, trading the office for the golf course or travel, but others scoff at the idea of retiring. They think their years and experience give them much to offer their clients. And they have an ulterior motive. They know people are better off, mentally and physi-cally, when they have a sense of purpose and a range of contacts and connections.

“Older people bring knowledge and a rational perspective on the ups and downs of the market,” says Joanne Ferguson, president of Toronto-based consulting firm Advisor Pathways Inc. “They’ve experienced difficult markets more than once, and are able to give comfort and advice to clients based on many years of experience.”

Seniors also have patience and skepticism, useful attributes in dealing with a stock market that is cyclical and often irrational.

“Once you’ve been in the business a couple of decades, you’ve seen bull and bear markets come and go, players come and go, and some supposedly great ideas come and go,” says Sandra Foster, president of Toronto-based Headspring Consulting Inc. “It takes time to learn the difference between what you’ve been told by ‘book learning’ and promotional hype, and what you come to see as your own truth. Older advisors can often be more objective about what’s best for clients.”

As well, the evidence shows that working stimulates the brain and offers a sense of productivity that hobbies often don’t. And the more entrepreneurial the occupation, the deeper the attachment.

“Some advisors are married to their business,” adds Foster. “Or, at least, in love with it and will leave ‘with their boots on’.”

But there are a couple of caveats to staying in the business well beyond the age of 65. You have to have a succession plan to enable a seamless transition for your clients at the time of your demise or departure, Foster says. You can choose to deal with only a select group of clients, and delegate the others to team members or an associate; you can cut back on the hours you work, possibly taking longer vacations or extended weekends. But you have to make sure your clients are cared for when it is time to exit.

In addition to a succession plan, it’s important to monitor your own ability to do the job, Foster says. You need to be conscious of any increase in errors or omissions, as costly mistakes can quickly hurt your business. You also need to keep up with current events and continue to develop skills, such as a facility with computers.

“The financial advice business is ideal for someone who wants to be a little less active but still keep his or her hand in,” says Dan Richards, president of Strategic Imperatives Ltd. in Toronto. “Many advisors choose to manage a small group of clients rather than continuing to build their book. They focus on what they like to do best.”

Investment Executive talked to five senior statesmen in the Canadian financial services industry about why they continue to work and how they do it. Their stories follow:



Al Pearlstein, 81, vice president and senior investment advisor of the Pearlstein Group, which operates under the RBC Dominion Securities Inc. umbrella in To-ronto, possesses the equanimity of someone who has weathered 14 significant market downturns. “I’ve seen a lot of cycles,” he says. “I’m always ready to sell when times are good and buy in times of wariness and concern.”

Pearlstein has also seen a lot of changes. When he started in the brokerage business in 1950, you weren’t allowed to make cold calls on the phone, he says; you had to go out and knock on doors, a rule implemented by regulators clamping down on fast-talking promoters of mining scams.

Although Pearlstein’s original intention was to retire at age 40 in 1967, by the time that rolled around, he had four children and a lot of responsibilities. “That killed the deal,” he says.

Now, Pearlstein shares an office in north Toronto with his sons, Geoffrey, 51, and Mark, 49. Pearlstein works a 40-hour week, about half of the 70 to 80 hours he once put in, arriving at work at 7 a.m. He usually ends his day by having lunch with Geoffrey and Mark.

@page_break@“We discuss matters of business, government policy, market activity, new issues, interest rates, economics,” Pearlstein says, “the whole gamut of the investment world.”

In the afternoons, Pearlstein goes to the gym or, if the weather is good, he heads to a nearby golf course. A brush with prostate cancer a few years ago increased his awareness of the importance of mental stimulation, physical activity and a healthy diet in maintaining his youthful energy and enthusiastic outlook.

Pearlstein has always taken a conservative, value-oriented approach to investing, and his responsibilities now revolve around longer-term portfolio strategies and asset-mix decisions for clients. He has never been a big fan of packaged products such as wraps and mutual funds, and his firm specializes in assembling individually tailored portfolios.

Fear and greed never disappear as key influencers of stock prices, he says. In bull markets, when stocks are flying high, less than 10% of clients are willing to take anything off the table. “People hang on to the ephemeral hope that things will keep going higher,” he says. “But that means that when things go down, they will have no cash reserves to buy anything at good value.”

Pearlstein and his sons share responsibility for clients, and Pearlstein’s clients have become accustomed to dealing with the next generation. “Working together has helped my sons and me maintain a connection,” Pearlstein says. “We have contact on a daily basis, and that adds to the strength of the family.”

He enjoys staying in touch with his clients, most of whom he has known for 30 to 50 years. He has always had a disciplined office-management process and keeps files on client conversations “from the time they first come in until they pass away,” and his sons now share in the record-keeping.

“If you’re not organized and the left hand doesn’t know what the right is doing, things can fall through the cracks,” Pearlstein says. “That can be expensive.”



Bradley Sumner got into the financial planning business late in life — in his late 40s — and he doesn’t plan to get out of it till late in life, if ever.

Sumner is a certified financial planner and chartered life underwriter with Investment Planning Counsel, maintaining offices in Toronto and Kingston, Ont.

His entry into the business marked two life changes: he left his previous career as a distributor of industrial parts for the manufacturing and resources industries, and was settling down to have a family.

Still going strong at age 70, with his kids in their 20s, he has no plans to retire. But he is adding the odd extra day on to a weekend, and taking a few extensive trips with his wife.

“I think ‘retirement’ is one of the worst words in the English language,” Sumner says. “A person at 65 or 70 has many years of good health ahead, God willing. At 85 or 90, you can still do things that interest you. I look at some retired people and they are like dead men walking. They’re not plugged into society; they’re desperately looking for satisfaction in social or travel activities.”

What keeps Sumner working is the satisfaction that comes from being able to do something worthwhile for people. Many of his clients — who are close to Sumner in age — are dependent on his help to preserve and transfer wealth, and he doesn’t want to walk away from them.

Estate planning is a large part of Sumner’s work, using strategies such as trusts, life insurance, annuities and the timing of disbursements to a beneficiary.

“Inheritances are going to cause a tremendous amount of money to fall into spending hands,” he says. “People need to manage money so that it provides a continuing income for a long period of life. Many responsible people have difficulty managing money, for all kinds of reasons, and even those who are good at it often make mistakes. One or two mistakes can dangerously deplete assets.

“In this industry, we’re damn close to our clients,” Sumner says. “In many cases, grandparents are helping their grandchildren with things such as funding education. The parents are up to their necks in debt and can’t see past the next gas pump. We’re dealing with a lot of intergenerational issues.”

Sumner dabbles in golf, but can’t imagine making a full-time activity of lowering his handicap. Adventure still calls, and he dreams of having a motorcycle and cruising country roads. He wouldn’t want to spend half the winter in Florida, but can imagine a month in Mexico each year, staying in touch with clients by e-mail. He enjoys reading history and then visiting parts of the world where historical figures lived and events took place.

“Every day I wake up is a sunny day,” he says. “I look forward to my tasks and serving clients and, in turn, their beneficiaries — who will never know the thought and work that was put into providing them with financial security.”



Fred Ketchen, 72, says the brokerage business is in his blood. A director of Scotia Capital Inc. in Toronto, he has travelled a long and exciting road in his half-century in the business, starting as a high-school student working summers as a board marker on the trading floor of the Toronto Stock Exchange.

Ketchen was hooked early. His father was vice president of administration for the TSE for almost 40 years. When Ketchen’s father went to work on Saturday mornings, he often deposited the young Fred in the TSE member’s lounge; there, the boy was impressed by the cushy leather chairs, plush Persian carpets and the big radio.

Ketchen originally planned a career as a journalist, but decided the pay was too low. In 1957, he joined what was then McLeod Young Weir & Co., donned the firm’s tartan jacket and became a floor trader in the frantic din of the open-outcry system.

Eventually, Ketchen moved to the trading desk at MYW and, in 1988, when the firm was gobbled up by Bank of Nova Scotia, he was appointed senior vice president and director of equity trading at the newly christened ScotiaMcLeod Inc. A year later he became a governor of the TSE, then vice chairman and later chairman of the exchange.

“I worry about what the heck I would do if either I or ScotiaMcLeod decided I had to retire,” Ketchen admits. “I arrive at my office every day at 6:15 a.m. and don’t leave till 6:30 p.m. or later. It’s a long day, but it’s exciting, challenging and rewarding. I talk to all kinds of people about all kinds of things, and I enjoy it.”

Ketchen has learned the hard way not to let the stress get to him. He had two heart attacks in 1991 and took four months off work to recover. A year ago, he had an operation to put a third stent in his heart. “I’m not a stuntman,” he says. “I’m a ‘stentman’.”

As a result, Ketchen has cut fat from his diet and has learned to calm down. “Life will go on,” he says. “If you want to go on with it, you have to learn to deal with problems. I used to get upset easily; now, I’ve learned to handle things in a different way.”

The elegant Ketchen — who favours the formality of three-piece suits — is something of a media star, thanks to his ability to deliver succinct and interesting commentary on the markets. He delivers at least 10 stock reports a day for radio stations across Canada. He also makes occasional television appearances and is frequently quoted in the financial press.

“It’s fun,” Ketchen says. “I have to follow the markets closely, and not be afraid to have opinions. It keeps me alert.”

Ketchen’s daughter, Sherilyn, works with him on the client side, and Ketchen the father is still signing up new clients.

“I’ve had some of my clients for as long as 35 years, and I would miss them if I disengaged,” he says. “Helping people manage their money is extremely rewarding. That’s why we’re in this business.”



Gerald Burgess, 73, CFP and co-founder of Burgess LeClerc Financial Group Inc. of Toronto, part of Worldsource Financial Management Inc., has always been open to new ideas. For example, he and his wife have shared a house for the past eight years with another couple. The husband of the other couple recently entered a long-term care facility for Alzheimer’s patients. So, Burgess now shares the house with the two women.

But change has always created opportu-nities for Burgess, who moved to Canada from Britain when he was a young man. He worked as a manager for Bank of Montreal, leaving the security of a banker’s salary in his early 40s to sell insurance for what is now Manulife Financial Corp. Commission income proved lucrative, but he didn’t want to be restricted to selling the products of one company. In the mid-1980s, Burgess started his own business, selling both investment products and insurance.

“I worked closely with a chartered accountant who introduced me to some NHL players who had RRSPs,” says Burgess, who was among the first advisors in Canada to obtain the CFP designation. “I realized I should be doing investments as well as insurance. ”

Soon after starting his firm, a product seminar introduced him to segregated funds and Burgess saw their potential for achieving higher returns for his clients. He found the product’s principal guarantees made for an easy transition for clients who were used to guaranteed investment certificates. Burgess continues to look for products on the leading edge of investment trends. For example, the recent action in emerging markets has led him to funds sponsored by Excel Funds Management Inc. that have benefited from the phenomenal growth in Asia.

For the past five years, Burgess’s mobility has been limited by inclusion body myositis, a rare disease that results in atrophy of the muscles, forcing him to use a cane and wheelchair. He recently relinquished his role as choirmaster and organist for his local church as he no longer has the ability to “play to my own exacting standards.”

But Burgess still enjoys music. He plays the piano regularly at a seniors’ facility in Colborne, Ont., east of Toronto, where he also keeps an office. As a member of the Ontario Cathedral Singers, Burgess travels to Europe once a year; he has sung in Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, St. Paul’s in London and several other cathedrals in Britain.

Despite Burgess’s physical limitations, he continues to work five days a week, spending about half his time in his Toronto office and the other half in Colborne. He has a client base of 700 clients, some of whom he has known for 30 years. Weekends and evenings often find him looking at client files and pondering solutions for financial needs. Although he enjoys reading such authors as Dick Francis and Bill Bryson for pleasure, Burgess is equally happy studying client statements.

“When I was a bank manager, I could do loans, mortgages and GICs. But now I have the ability to do total financial planning,” Burgess says. “I talk to my clients about how they want to retire, what they want to do about helping their kids, the need to have a will and powers of attorney. I enjoy talking to people about their lives. I know what questions to ask, and can help them come up with the answers that are suitable for them.”

Burgess plans never to retire. Associate Todd Gellatly is in his 30s and helps Burgess deal with his clients. The business will pass to Gellatly upon Burgess’s death.

“I work for the satisfaction of helping people,” Burgess says. “Over the years, I have gathered a lot of information, expertise and qualifications. The thing I enjoy most is sharing all that experience with my clients.”



Horst Mueller, the dean of Canadian technical market analysts, just celebrated his 80th birthday, but he is too engrossed in predicting stock-market trends to think about retirement.

Mueller has already “retired” twice, but it was always to do something more exciting in the world of technical analysis. The first time, he retired from CIBC Wood Gundy Inc. at 65 but took his skills to Sprott Securities Ltd. because he wanted experience working at a small boutique. Then Mueller went back to Wood Gundy for a few years, but left again in 2001 to start his own firm, Mueller Behavioral Analytics Inc. Now working from an office in downtown Toronto and counting some of Canada’s top institutional players among his clients, Mueller is in his element.

“When you’re a market analyst, your learning increases with age and experience,” Mueller says. “It’s not like sports, where your kick might get shorter. We get better on the job, not worse.”

Mueller comes from a long-lived family and expects many healthy years ahead. His grandfather lived to 96 and his father to 94, staying strong and active until the end. His brother is 82 and still teaches orchestral conducting at the renowned Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.

Mueller, born in Heidelberg, Germany, to a Wagnerian opera singer, originally made his living playing the French horn. He spent some time in Bogota, Colombia, playing in the symphony before moving to Canada in 1957, where he dabbled in the stock market to supplement his earnings as a musician. A car accident in 1964 damaged his lips and teeth, and playing the horn professionally became impossible. He turned his attention to studying the stock market seriously.

In addition to maintaining an interest in music, Mueller is an avid birdwatcher and photographer, and he travels the world in search of rare specimens to capture on film. His wife, an artist, travels with him to sketch birds. It’s not unusual for Mueller to walk 25 kilometres a day on his birdwatching expeditions, packing 15 pounds of equipment.

“It’s important to have a serious hobby,” he says. “It gets you away from things in the financial world — and it’s refreshing to have a complete change in thinking.”

Mueller says there are links between music and the markets: momentum, volume and timing play a role in both, as does human emotion. “I learn different things from each discipline, but they give me the opportunity to study the psychology of people,” he says. “What you learn from one pursuit contributes to the other. It’s fun — that’s all there is to it.”

Mueller studies a variety of factors in devising his market forecasts, which keeps his mind active. In 2000, he predicted at least a 10-year commodities boom, and he’s getting a kick out of watching it unfold.