Our broker/dealer
A broker/dealer is a company that a registered investment professional is required to affiliate with in order to buy and sell investment products on behalf of investors. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) delegates the supervision of financial advisors to the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA). FINRA, in turn, requires us to choose a broker/dealer to partner with on your behalf.
Commonwealth Financial Network®
As the nation’s largest privately held independent broker/dealer–RIA with $1 billion in annual revenues*, Commonwealth has the scale, stability, and resources to help us deliver the solutions our clients need. With a staff of approximately 810, Commonwealth helps approximately 1,710 independent advisors serve their clients and manage total account assets of approximately $114.4 billion.**
The fact that we’ve chosen to work with Commonwealth means that our firm remains independent and free to act in your best interest, without without pressure to promote a particular product or strategy. It’s a model that differs from that of some other, larger financial firms known as wirehouses, whose financial representatives are accountable not just to their clients, but also to the parent company that employs them.
Commonwealth is second to none in its commitment to safeguarding your privacy and ensuring that your investment data remains secure. From encryption standards to disaster recovery plans and other measures the firm employs, we are confident that the information our clients entrust us with will remain secure.
Commonwealth is also independently owned and managed, which means the firm retains the freedom to allocate resources where they’re needed and to act in the best interests of its financial advisors and their clients—not shareholders.
*As of 01/19/17 **As of 12/31/16
Outstanding Service and Security for Your Accounts
As part of our efort to provide you with quality service, our broker-dealer has an agreement with National FInancial Services, LLC by which National Financial Services, LLC provides trade execution, clearing and other realted services for your brokerage account.
Fidelity Clearing & Custody SolutionsSM provides a comprehensive clearing and custody platform, brokerage services, trading capabilities, and practice management and consulting to registered investment advisors (RIAs), including strategic acquirers and professional asset managers, as well as retirement recordkeepers, broker-dealer firms, banks, and insurance companies through National Financial Services LLC (NFS) or Fidelity Brokerage Services LLC, Members NYSE, SIPC. In addition to providing services to third-party institutions, the NFS brokerage platform supports all the clearing and custody businesses at Fidelity, including Fidelity’s retail and capital markets businesses, bringing NFS assets under administration to $3.1 trillion.
How Your Assets are Protected
Investmark is a member of the Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC). Additionally, our broker-dealer, Commonwealth, and NFS are also both members. The SIPC was created in 1970 to protect customers of member broker-dealer firms in case of broker-dealer liquidation.
“Excess of SIPC” Coverage
In addition to SIPC protection, NFS provides for brokerage accounts additional “excess of SIPC” coverage through Lloyd’s of London, together with other insurers.1 The excess of SIPC coverage will be used only when SIPC coverage is exhausted. Like SIPC protection, excess of SIPC protection does not cover investment losses in customer accounts due to market fluctuation. It also does not cover other claims for losses incurred while broker-dealers remain in business. Total aggregate excess of SIPC coverage available through NFS’s excess of SIPC policy is $1 billion. Within NFS’s excess of SIPC coverage, there is no per-account dollar limit on coverage of securities, but there is a per-account limit of $1.9 million on coverage of cash. This is the maximum excess of SIPC protection currently available in the brokerage industry.
1 Fidelity’s “excess of SIPC” insurance is provided by Lloyd’s of London together with Axis Specialty Europe Ltd., Markel International
Insurance Company, XL Specialty Insurance Company, and Munich Reinsurance Co.
Fidelity Investments is an independent company, unaffiliated with Commonwealth Financial Network and Investmark. Fidelity Investments is a service provider to Commonwealth Financial Network. There is no form of legal partnership, agency affiliation, or similar relationship between your financial advisor and Fidelity Investments, nor is such a relationship created or implied by the information herein. Fidelity Investments has not been involved with the preparation of the content supplied by Commonwealth Financial Network and does not guarantee, or assume any responsibility for, its content. Fidelity Investments is a registered trademark of FMR LLC. Fidelity Clearing & Custody SolutionsSM provides clearing, custody, and other brokerage services through National Financial Services LLC or Fidelity Brokerage Services LLC, Members NYSE, SIPC.