Great piece, Dave. Having been a Vanguard client for almost 50 years and encountered their talented employees in my professional roles, I agree this is an amazing sandbox for Salim to play in, lead, and organize. I would support your idea that they should lead the passive/active debate but also use their platform to promote education of investors and regulators of the implications of growth of assets in large scale, structured fund strategies. Mostly this brings benefits (cost, better product choice, transparency), but the implications for market dynamics, shareholder governance etc. are more complex. Look forward to seeing how he carries on Jack Bogle’s legacy.
I have been a long-time investor (40 years) with Vanguard and have always trusted and respected the company and the low-cost funds they offer. Over the past 10 years, three things have become more evident when comparing Vanguard with the marketplace. 1- The Vanguard websites offered don't have the robustness many competitors have. This is critical to user experience and retention. 2- The push to promote advisor fee-based services has gotten to the point of being annoying. I don't need to be reminded every time I sign-in about advisor services. 3- Administrative Fees are slowly starting to increase at Vanguard. All this chips away at returns. You have an amazing company and I wish CEO Salim Ramji much success.
There is a new idea that is being floated, promoted and being forced on public, that all the money one has has to be "invested". It is becoming very difficult to peacefully park your money safely, banks and Vanguard included as they all want to manage and control people's money. And create work for newly hired freshly campus minted financial experts and advisors trying to become partners.
Between 2010 and 2020 I conducted a 10 year comparison between VG, Fidelity and WellsTrade to determine where I would consolidate in retirement. With a 33/33/33 split I had the opportunity to compare the websites, ,research tools, ease of use, reporting, buying,selling & transfer mechanisms as well as customer service, cash management and security. I was hoping VG would win but by 2015 it was clear Fidelity would. I let the experiment run in the name of "institutional diversification" until leaving the workforce in 2020 when I transferred everything to Fidelity. VG is a victim of its own success resting on its laurels because low-cost indexing hasnt been a competitive advantage for 20 years.
Poor website. I tried to have tax withholding on line. Couldn't. I called and was told that I will have to submit a written request (no bragging about paperlessness here). And that tax withholding will be flat 24%, no more, no less. Wow. But done. Two months later I tried to see on website, couldn't find how much tax was being withheld. Called and was guided through a maze of steps to find it. You have to be almost an archeologist to be able to see it. Customer blindfolded, will probably be gaged down the road. I used to be Vanguard, but not anymore.
Vanguard also needs to eliminate all of their pesky fees, their website is sub-par and have had to wait a long time to reach a Customer Service agent on the phone...
Only recent positive, Vanguard appears to have backed-off from their pro-ESG stance which doesn't put shareholder interests first.
I should also note, that I pulled a great of money out of Vanguard because their Customer Service representatives gave me conflicting information and their website had conflicting information: they had one set of instructions for the Executor of the Estate vs. Beneficiaries re: Inheritance and Customer Service refused to talk with me re: the specifics of the account even though I was the DPoA.
Great piece, Dave. Having been a Vanguard client for almost 50 years and encountered their talented employees in my professional roles, I agree this is an amazing sandbox for Salim to play in, lead, and organize. I would support your idea that they should lead the passive/active debate but also use their platform to promote education of investors and regulators of the implications of growth of assets in large scale, structured fund strategies. Mostly this brings benefits (cost, better product choice, transparency), but the implications for market dynamics, shareholder governance etc. are more complex. Look forward to seeing how he carries on Jack Bogle’s legacy.
Sandbox is the right word!
Love this
Thanks ace
I have been a long-time investor (40 years) with Vanguard and have always trusted and respected the company and the low-cost funds they offer. Over the past 10 years, three things have become more evident when comparing Vanguard with the marketplace. 1- The Vanguard websites offered don't have the robustness many competitors have. This is critical to user experience and retention. 2- The push to promote advisor fee-based services has gotten to the point of being annoying. I don't need to be reminded every time I sign-in about advisor services. 3- Administrative Fees are slowly starting to increase at Vanguard. All this chips away at returns. You have an amazing company and I wish CEO Salim Ramji much success.
There is a new idea that is being floated, promoted and being forced on public, that all the money one has has to be "invested". It is becoming very difficult to peacefully park your money safely, banks and Vanguard included as they all want to manage and control people's money. And create work for newly hired freshly campus minted financial experts and advisors trying to become partners.
Between 2010 and 2020 I conducted a 10 year comparison between VG, Fidelity and WellsTrade to determine where I would consolidate in retirement. With a 33/33/33 split I had the opportunity to compare the websites, ,research tools, ease of use, reporting, buying,selling & transfer mechanisms as well as customer service, cash management and security. I was hoping VG would win but by 2015 it was clear Fidelity would. I let the experiment run in the name of "institutional diversification" until leaving the workforce in 2020 when I transferred everything to Fidelity. VG is a victim of its own success resting on its laurels because low-cost indexing hasnt been a competitive advantage for 20 years.
Poor website. I tried to have tax withholding on line. Couldn't. I called and was told that I will have to submit a written request (no bragging about paperlessness here). And that tax withholding will be flat 24%, no more, no less. Wow. But done. Two months later I tried to see on website, couldn't find how much tax was being withheld. Called and was guided through a maze of steps to find it. You have to be almost an archeologist to be able to see it. Customer blindfolded, will probably be gaged down the road. I used to be Vanguard, but not anymore.
Vanguard also needs to eliminate all of their pesky fees, their website is sub-par and have had to wait a long time to reach a Customer Service agent on the phone...
Only recent positive, Vanguard appears to have backed-off from their pro-ESG stance which doesn't put shareholder interests first.
I should also note, that I pulled a great of money out of Vanguard because their Customer Service representatives gave me conflicting information and their website had conflicting information: they had one set of instructions for the Executor of the Estate vs. Beneficiaries re: Inheritance and Customer Service refused to talk with me re: the specifics of the account even though I was the DPoA.
I have no confidence in their ability to execute!
You should also mention the weak web site, app and customer service