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Name:

Rawl Fingal

Occupation:

Factory employee at Maple Leaf Foods

Location:

Port Perry, Ont.

Age:

61

Investing since:

The mid-1990s

Has an advisor?

“I’ve never had an advisor,” he says. The father of five prefers to get advice from his brother, a physician, who “introduced me to investing years ago, starting with RESPs” and then equities. “I’ve never questioned him.”

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This article is part of the Advisor’s Edge 20 Ways to Be a Better Advisor feature package, published in the June 2018 edition of AE. Click here for more tips and to learn about our 20th anniversary.

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Rawl Fingal, who grew up in a military family in Trenton, Ont., reads reports from the Big Five banks to get the latest on markets and the economy. For more than 20 years, he’s also swapped investment ideas with his brother, Steve, several times a week.

One key to investing is “doing your own research,” he says. His current interest is Canadian cannabis stocks due to the Liberal government’s impending legalization plans. He’s read about recent deals between medical marijuana companies and pharmacy giants like Shoppers Drug Mart.

Fingal doesn’t work with an advisor, but says he might if he needed research help. He’d expect to be involved in choosing investments, and for his advisor to thoroughly explain and review his portfolio as well as “show him the numbers.”

I would want them to explain trends to me, and market ups and downs with historical graphs,” he says. This would help him decide how and when to invest.

Most of all, he’d value an advisor who would bring new ideas to the table. “They have ways of doing research that I don’t,” says Fingal, who would also want the advisor to be co-invested. “You can’t give me advice in something you’re not involved in.”

Whether by phone, email or in person, Fingal would seek communication once per week.

Why market knowledge matters

Fingal credits his investments in equities and real estate for helping him pay for his children’s education—when he was married, he and his ex-wife started buying properties that they’ve rented.

His market knowledge has also led to financial freedom. Before investing, Fingal says, “I had never owned a brand-new car.” But that changed after he put money into a mining stock in the mid-1990s: when driving his first new car off the lot, he says, “I was so emotional that I cried all the way home.”

He wishes more people understood how markets work, and takes every opportunity to spread that message. “If you talk to people about money, they run away,” he says, but making investments “can help improve your financial situation. I try to help people, and my children are following in my footsteps.”