Warning: This movie is rated ‘FG’ – Fiduciary Guidance. For Mature Advisers Only.
Plot: The Starship Pension Prize has discovered a strange new plan-et inhabited by the Klingons, a crafty race known for hawking lightly regulated insurance products. The Starship’s chief officer, Captain James T. Kirk, plans to explore compliance with the Federation’s fiduciary adviser rule.
Voice over by Kirk, with a scene of deep space and scary music in the background: Fiduciary advice: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the Starship Pension Prize. Its mission: to explore strange new eligible investment advice arrangements, to seek out generally accepted investment theories, and to boldly go where no regulator has gone before.
Opening Scene: 2nd Voice over by Kirk as he writes inside his cabin: Captain’s Star Log: 2275. The Fiduciary Adviser Rule has been in effect for 263 years. We have received disturbing reports that in far flung galaxies of the Universe, a number of Klingon advisers are blatantly ignoring it. I am planning to personally investigate a strange new phenomenon picked up by the Starship Pension Prize from the plan-et we now orbit. The sounds, when amplified, seem to be saying ‘risk-free investment; can’t go wrong.’
(Script: Kirk walks to the transporter chamber and motions to Chief Medical Officer Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy and First Officer Spock to join him.) He turns to Chief Engineer “Scotty” Scott: Beam us down, Scotty. I need to check out the eligible investment advice arrangement on the plan-et. My sensors indicate it is a computer model advice program.
Scott: Aye-aye, Cap’tun.
Spock: Captain, I recommend we set the phasers to stun. The Klingons are known for their self-dealing.
(Script: The Starship team is seen materializing on the planet below. They are greeted by a Klingon advisor who is smiling and jabbering as he shoves a thick document at Kirk.)
Kirk: Crap. The Klingon is trying to sell me an annuity in my 401(k) even before I can audit his computer program! My sensors aren’t detecting an annuity anywhere in the computer advice program. Bones! What do I do? Doesn’t this Klingon even have a heart beat? As a fiduciary, shouldn’t he know that I’m in the accumulation phase and that inflation outweighs longevity risk at this point?
McCoy: Jim, unfortunately, the Klingon can survive quite nicely without a heart and be richly rewarded at the same time. He can recommend the annuity option within the plan and then shed his fiduciary duty when cross-selling high-load products to the plan-et’s participants and beneficiaries outside of the eligible investment advice arrangement.
Kirk: Spock, can you detect any signs of intelligent life?
Spock: Unfortunately, no, Captain. I must agree with Bones. Not only is there no heart, but I can find no conscience – fiduciary or otherwise – in this Klingon. More importantly, he has apparently researched the rule carefully and complied with the letter of the law. I’m looking at an obscure section of the Fiduciary Adviser rule, (b)(4)(i)(G)(2)(i), which was written in the year 2011 by an extinct federal agency on Earth known as the Department of Labor. Incredibly, DoL allowed earthlings in the retirement plant to invest in an annuity option, notwithstanding the fact that the annuity could not be properly analyzed by the computer program.
(Spock pauses, then displays a quizzical look.) Captain, you would think that our advanced civilization would have computers capable of comparing accumulation rates of annuities versus equities, and other critical factors such as the equity premium and inflation risk. But apparently our scientists have not been able to succeed yet in mastering this process. All this Klingon adviser needs to do is furnish the plan-et participant with a general description of the annuity and how it operates. He then satisfies his disclosure requirements under the rule. Hence the Klingon’s irritating grin.
Kirk: Dammit, Spock, that loophole is big enough to drive a photon torpedo through. Beam us up, Scotty! I’m going to see if there are any DB plans left in the Universe to audit.
outstanding! I love this - thanks for the chuckle on yet another Friday where i feel i am choking in an atmosphere that does not support human life forms!
Posted by: skier | October 28, 2011 at 03:35 PM