Standard Trust Credit Union
Wealth Management Services (WMS) What We Do

Financial planning

There’s more to building a wealth management plan than simply putting money aside or choosing appropriate investments. Whether you’re building wealth, saving for higher education, planning your retirement, buying or selling a business, investing an inheritance or pondering your legacy, you need a comprehensive financial approach. Your plan should consider your investment strategy, tax ramifications, risk tolerance, insurance coverage, loans and non-financial assets such as real estate or personal property. Learn more about our Financial Planning Overview.

Goal Based Planning - Plan for What Matters Most

A goals-based planning proposal is a valuable tool. It will help you assess your current situation, identify areas where modifications would be beneficial, and make future projections. Goals-based planning has three steps:

After completing these steps, your advisor will recommend investment strategies designed to optimize your returns for your level of risk. Simulation charts will demonstrate the “best,” “most likely,” and “worst” case projected outcomes based on the recommended strategies. Once created, your proposal can be reviewed and updated periodically. Goals can be prioritized, keeping the focus on those that matter most to you.

Having You At the Center of Our Relationship

Goals-based planning is only a part of what Wealth Management Services does. The information we gather for your proposal may lead to questions about budgeting, tax strategies, insurance coverage, banking services, retirement planning or estate planning. We will happily advise you on those and other matters.

Perhaps your situation calls for a more wide-ranging financial plan. We offer a comprehensive financial planning process that covers all of the above items, plus evaluation of life insurance policies, guidance on social security benefits, analysis of liabilities, and information regarding charitable giving techniques.

All services we provide are intended to help you fulfill your aspirations and give you greater peace of mind. We will never forget that understanding your needs and concerns, hopes and fears, dreams and expectations is essential. After all, the most important asset we manage is our relationship with you.

wealth Management

Our investment management process begins with an assessment of needs, resources, and goals. Learn more about our Wealth Management.

Investment Philosophy

Partnering with you and your Wealth Advisor – who serves as a primary point of contact for all of our advisory services – our investment management team builds structured portfolios across three key asset classes: stocks, bonds, and alternative investments. Using individual securities or mutual funds, depending on the amount invested, we emphasize broad diversification, seeking securities and asset types with favorable risk/reward characteristics.

• For the stock portion of our portfolios, we typically diversify among a number of different investment styles and sectors – including large, mid and small-cap stocks, value and growth styles, and domestic and international securities. 
• With fixed income investments, we build actively-managed portfolios with individual securities or bond mutual funds. Each approach is designed to achieve attractive total return relative to appropriate benchmarks. For clients who prefer a more defensive approach, we build ladders of buy-and-hold bonds. 
• We also invest in alternative assets – such as commodities, currencies, or real estate investment trusts – to further enhance portfolio performance and reduce risk. 
• We have also created a number of unique portfolios with strategies to meet very specific and target investment goals.

Portfolios are actively managed using a disciplined, team-based approach. As markets and economies evolve, we make adjustments in the asset blend to capture relative value or reduce volatility. However, we do not swing for the fences by making large bets on future market movement; changes to the asset mix tend to develop more gradually, as we weigh a wide range of market developments and economic indicators.

trust services

The desire to provide financial security for present and future generations is a common concern for virtually every individual and family. It's important to create a plan that governs how and when you intend to transfer wealth to the people you love and the causes you care about. Learn more about Trust Services.