Commonwealth Independent Advisor

Mathew Powers, CFA, AIF

Mathew Powers, CFA®, AIF®, is supervisor, retirement consulting investment services, at Commonwealth Financial Network®, member FINRA/SIPC, the nation's largest privately held Registered Investment Adviser–independent broker/dealer. With the firm since 2014, he directs Commonwealth’s 3(38) fiduciary plan service, PlanAssist Investment Management. Mat’s team also manages the retirement plan investment recommended list and acts as a primary liaison for retirement plan advisors who have questions or issues regarding investment oversight practices. Mat has a master’s degree in investment management, and he is a CFA® charterholder.

Information about securities-registered professionals may be found at FINRA BROKERCHECK.

Recent Posts

What Type of Fiduciary Service Provider Are You?

Should You Partner with a 3(38) Fiduciary Service Provider?

Implementing a Consistent Retirement Plan Oversight Process

How to Help Plan Sponsor Clients Evaluate Financial Wellness Solutions

Quantitative Review of Retirement Plan Investments: The Criteria Set

What Type of Fiduciary Service Provider Are You?

Posted by Mathew Powers, CFA, AIF

May 29, 2019 at 1:30 PM

Administering a retirement plan and managing its assets involve specific responsibilities that can be difficult for most employers to perform. They first need to understand the rules and regulations of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA). This is complicated enough, and oftentimes it will require a fiduciary service provider to help the employer understand everything involved. ERISA sets standards of conduct for those who manage an employee benefit plan and its assets (i.e., fiduciaries). A plan must have at least one named plan fiduciary. For some plans, the plan fiduciary may be an administrative committee or a company’s board of directors. The key to determining whether an individual or an entity is a fiduciary is whether it is exercising discretion or control over the plan.

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Topics: Retirement Consulting

Should You Partner with a 3(38) Fiduciary Service Provider?

Posted by Mathew Powers, CFA, AIF

July 17, 2018 at 10:00 AM

As a retirement plan advisor, should you partner with a 3(38) fiduciary service provider? Here, we’ll consider the benefits of this type of partnership, as well as important factors to keep in mind when making this decision. But before we dive in, let’s start by looking at the defining characteristics of a 3(38) fiduciary.

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Topics: Retirement Consulting

Implementing a Consistent Retirement Plan Oversight Process

Posted by Mathew Powers, CFA, AIF

April 4, 2018 at 1:30 PM

If you're like many retirement plan advisors, saving time is among your most important goals. One area ripe with opportunity for improving efficiency and scale? Your plan-level investment services. By implementing a consistent retirement plan oversight process, these services will naturally become repeatable and streamlined. Let’s take a look at how leveraging guidelines, technology, and trusted partners can help you put such a process in place.

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Topics: Retirement Consulting

How to Help Plan Sponsor Clients Evaluate Financial Wellness Solutions

Posted by Mathew Powers, CFA, AIF

December 6, 2016 at 10:00 AM

For many employees, identifying and then taking the necessary steps to be ready for retirement is a crucial need. But for some individuals, this requires going beyond increased 401(k) savings or optimized asset allocations—to actually stabilizing their financial foundation. Fortunately, financial wellness solutions can be used to do just that.

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Topics: Retirement Consulting

Quantitative Review of Retirement Plan Investments: The Criteria Set

Posted by Mathew Powers, CFA, AIF

May 11, 2016 at 1:30 PM

Under ERISA, retirement plan fiduciaries have a duty to ensure that the menu of investment options available to plan participants is prudently selected and monitored over time. To this end, the Department of Labor highly encourages plan fiduciaries to establish an Investment Policy Statement (IPS) to outline the plan’s investment strategy and guide investment decisions. An IPS will typically define the plan’s investment objectives, outline responsibilities for fiduciaries, and define the process for how investment options are to be selected and monitored. One critical component of the IPS process is establishing the criteria set—the set of metrics by which investments are to be quantitatively considered.

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Topics: Retirement Consulting

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