KENSINGTON, MARYLANLD. June 11, 2009 – – CNBC seems to have a knack for broadcasting shows hosted by individuals with scant, shoddy, imprecise and/or misleading financial advice, according to Senior Financial Strategist Samuel N. Asare. The question Samuel Asare is asking is, “How can they keep getting away with it?”
Back in March, comedian Jon Stewart gave a highly publicized dressing down to Jim Cramer, host of CNBC’s “Mad Money,” seemingly taking him to task for all the bad financial advice the many hosts, analysts and commentators on his network had offered in the lead-up to the stock market collapse in September of last year.
More recently, famed money guru Suze Orman seemed to be backpedaling from her much touted “10 years consistently” advice about how to win in the stock market. In a recent mishmash, confused and difficult-to-interpret segment on her CNBC show, Orman seemed to be shifting to a message that investors with less than a 10-year window should be moving their money out of the market into “safe, consistently high-yielding” CDs and money market accounts.
“Where is she coming from? What does that even mean?” asked Asare on seeing Orman’s pseudo mea culpa. “I’m not convinced this woman has any financial training because the advice she is giving is just wrong. How can she – and all the rest of them – continue to get away with it?” Asare questioned.
The FCC regulates television shows for things like nudity and language, and it prohibits advertisers from making false claims – but where is the regulation when it comes to false, erroneous or misleading claims made by TV financial advisors? FINRA and, ultimately, the SEC regulate the advice a financial professional can offer an individual client and the kinds of claims he or she can make about their results. So why is no one regulating the advice proffered by advisors, pundits, analysts and others who use the TV to influence the decisions of millions of American consumers?
“The problem is that people listen to these TV gurus,” Asare said, “and in doing so, some have lost vast portions of their wealth. The worst thing is those who’ve seen huge percentages of their retirement funds just vanish. It’s time we get serious about who is allowed to offer televised financial advice, at the very least screening them for credentials, if not regulating them just like the rest of the industry is regulated.
“I’m not sure what that looks like, but I’d sure like to be on the advisory team that puts a plan together or testifies before Congress on the need for this type of regulation. As Jon Stewart told Jim Cramer that day on his show, ‘This isn’t a [expletive] game.’”