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The Soul of Wealth with Dr. Daniel Crosby | E12106 Feb 202500:49:16
In this episode, Jason welcomes back listeners to 'Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners' after a hiatus, and announces a new video format with guest Dr. Daniel Crosby, a New York Times bestselling author and Chief Behavioral Officer at Orion. Dr. Crosby discusses his latest book, 'The Soul of Wealth: 50 Reflections on Money and Meaning,' exploring the intertwining of wealth with meaning and purpose. They delve into the PERMA model of positive psychology, the importance of naming financial goals, and how psychological and behavioural insights can enhance financial well-being. Dr. Crosby shares personal anecdotes, including his health scare that led to the book's inspiration, and the notion that true wealth transcends mere financial achievement, emphasizing meaningful engagement, relationships, and personal growth.

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Employee Ownership Trusts Revisited with Jon Shell | E12004 Jul 202400:32:17

In this episode, Jason talks to Jon Shell about the advent of employee ownership trusts in Canada, a game-changing legislation that addresses previous concerns and paves the way for a more inclusive and equitable business ownership structure. Through a deep dive into the intricacies of this model, listeners are offered a comprehensive understanding of its benefits, implications, and transformative potential for both business owners and employees alike.


Episode Highlights:

  • 00:51: Jon shares his enthusiasm for being back on the podcast, reinforcing the collaborative nature of the conversation and evidencing the ongoing dialogue within the financial community on employee ownership.
  • 00:57: Jon Shell discusses the context of the budget that introduced employee ownership trusts, identifying it as a standout positive in a predominantly negative financial announcement. His perspective sets the stage for an exploration of how this model can change the future of business ownership in Canada.
  • 01:12: Shell provides a background on his role at Social Capital Partners, highlighting the organization's mission to democratize asset ownership and its focused efforts on advancing employee ownership as a vehicle for social and economic equity.
  • 05:46: Tax incentives associated with employee ownership trusts are explored, providing clarity on the fiscal advantages for selling business owners, including significant capital gains tax exemptions.
  • 06:11: The conversation shifts to the legislative nuances of employee ownership trusts and the substantial economic and societal benefits these structures offer, fostering job creation, economic resilience, and employee welfare.
  • 08:18: Details on the specific rights and benefits that employees gain through participating in an employee ownership trust are outlined, offering insights into how this model promotes financial inclusion and workplace democracy.
  • 12:12: The episode concludes with a forward-looking discussion on the potential expansion and long-term impact of employee ownership trusts in Canada, indicating a bright future for this innovative business model.


Key Takeaways:

  • Employee ownership trusts offer a transformative model for business succession, aligning economic incentives with social benefits. - Tax incentives for business owners, including a substantial capital gains tax exemption, make this an attractive option for ensuring legacy and employee welfare.
  • Employees gain not just from financial participation in the success of their company but also from having a voice in its governance, promoting a more democratic and equitable workplace.
  • The introduction of employee ownership trusts represents a significant shift towards more inclusive capitalism, with potential long-term benefits for the Canadian economy and society.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "Employee ownership trusts redefine business legacy and inclusivity."
  • "The transformative power of employee ownership trusts aligns profit with purpose."
  • "Economic resilience is built on the foundation of employee ownership." 


Resources Mentioned:

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2024 Compensation Planning with Luc Lapalme | E11112 Oct 202300:23:25

Jason talks to Luc Lapalme, Senior Principal at Mercer. It is a very large consulting company that consults on various aspects of business. Today he will be discussing about their compensation planning survey, and this is a survey about employers and what they are looking to accomplish or what they are looking to do when it comes to salaries for staff in the coming year.


Episode Highlights:

  • 01.15: Luc explains that he specializes in compensation management and advises clients on various aspects of compensation programs, including salary structures and incentive design for both executives and salaried employees.
  • 04.30: Jason mentions that in recent years, there has been a realization among many that simply matching salary increases to inflation may not be sufficient, especially when inflation rates are high.
  • 10.03: Luc mentions that organizations are increasingly providing off-cycle adjustments to their employees, which are not officially included in the budget forecasts. These off-cycle adjustments are often provided to employees at higher risk or those due for promotions.
  • 12.06: Luc notes that certain organizations are targeting the 75th percentile of the market to ensure they are highly competitive with specific roles. This highlights the efforts being made by organizations to attract and retain talent in a rapidly evolving work environment.
  • 21.48: By focusing on employee engagement and the employee experience, HR managers can enhance job satisfaction and retention, even in situations with tighter budgets, says Luc. 


3 Key Points:

  1. Luc highlights the impact of the great resignation during the pandemic, which led to increased employee turnover and job changes. However, he notes that attrition rates have decreased, with one study showing a drop from 21% to 18%, indicating more stable employment.
  2. Luc provides an example of how changes in minimum wage, such as the increase in Ontario's minimum wage, can create ripple effects and competitive pressures in the labour market for more competitive pay.
  3. Jason shares an example from the accounting field in the US, where large accounting firms in cities like New York and Washington, DC, began recruiting talent from across the country. This resulted in some smaller to mid-sized cities experiencing reduced operations or becoming less attractive for talent acquisition due to the significantly higher salaries offered in larger cities.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • “The Compensation survey is conducted annually to gather information from participating organizations. Its primary purpose is to understand the organizations' intentions regarding salary adjustments, particularly for the year 2024” - Luc.
  • “The differing salary forecasts between Canada and the United States can be attributed to various socioeconomic factors.” - Luc
  • “While organizations are becoming more transparent about salary bands, they are generally not disclosing specific employee salary details or bonus information due to privacy concerns.” - Luc


Resources Mentioned:



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Outsourcing Financial Operations of Your Business with Josh Zweig | E02102 Jul 202000:36:27

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, talks with Josh Zweig, CEO and Partner at LiveCA. Josh Zweig talks about the benefits of outsourcing various financial functions and work to a professional accounting firm that can do it on your behalf, supporting ongoing engagement with your clients. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:10 – Josh Zweig explains what LiveCA does. 

● 01:33 – Where is LiveCA’s physical location? 

● 02:56 – How does their business model enable clients with their offerings? 

● 05:05 – What is the best practice for efficiency? 

● 09:07 – How often does LiveCA reengineer a client’s system? 

● 12:13 – What is the first thing someone should contemplate when looking to potential outsource? 

● 18:05 – Set up your system to scale. 

● 21:09 – How does the pay-per-use business model change the relationship with consumers? 

● 25:05 – Ask customers about their personal lives to be able to advise them better for needs that they may have never thought of. 

● 26:53 – What should you look for in an outsource firm? 

● 30:55 – How has LIveCA been able to help businesses during COVID-19? 


3 Key Points 

1. LiveCA has an account’s payable team, a payroll team, a bookkeeping team, and all of those teams work with their tech teams and their client service teams. 

2. Outsourcing should serve as being a fraction of a full-time person. 

3. LiveCA takes into account how fast a business is growing and they lay processes that are adaptable to even when that business hires more people. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “LiveCA is Canada’s largest online CPA firm and what we do is a combination of the tax and accounting that you would expect a typical CPA to do and we combine that with a knowledge of technology and financial workflow.” – Josh Zweig 

● “Scoping is basically us going, can we help you? If so, here is what help looks like and finally, here is how much it costs.” – Josh Zweig 

● “I would look at the outsourcing process as two-fold. One is, how are you doing the process? And two, who is doing it?” – Josh Zweig 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – Jason Pereira Website 

● Linkedin – Josh Zwaig

● liveca.ca – Website for LiveCA 

● josh@liveca.ca – Josh Zwaig Email


Full Transcript

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Valuing Your Business With Melanie Russell | E02025 Jun 202000:28:34

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, talks with Melanie Russell, President of Kalex Valuations. Melanie Russell, is a business evaluator who does so to meet the needs of businesses for a range of issues like MNA and family law issues. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:16 – Melanie Russell, explains what he does for a living. 

● 03:18 – What does the process of valuation look like? 

● 04:56 – What types of metrics does she use to come up with a number? 

● 07:00 – Valuation is ultimately a finance-driven study. 

● 10:07 – How is valuation looked at differently by different roles that people play? 

● 12:13 – What are some of the key factors that add to high valuations? 

● 15:00 – How much education or push-back does she get when dealing with valuations? 

● 16:32 – How does she go about normalizing expenses back into the cash flow? 

● 19:26 – How much does sweat equity create push back during the valuation process? 

● 23:36 – Melanie Russell discusses tax planning and estate freezes. 


3 Key Points 

1. Cash flow is generally what drives investors. 

2. Liquidity is one the biggest difference between private company valuations and public company valuations. 

3. Currently, the trend appears to be more capital-based sophisticated purchases versus just strategic ones. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “I am by background a legacy CA, CPA that specializes in the area of valuations.” – Melanie Russell 

● “Valuations are business assets that are used for various purposes, whether it’s trying to sell as business, whether it is trying to transition to the next generation or to employees, whether it is a dispute.” – Melanie Russell 

● “My value add is telling business owners or asset owners what someone might pay based on logical, rational thinking.” – Melanie Russell 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – Website

● Linkedin – Melanie Russell

● Kalexvaluations.com – Website for Kalex Valuations 

● Linkedin – Melanie Russell’s Phone Number: (416) 488-9590 Ext. 225 

● Melanie@Kalexvaluations.com – Melanie Russell’s Email


Full Transcript

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Tracking Shares with Jonah Mayles | E01918 Jun 202000:26:52

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, talks with Jonah Mayles, Partner, Tax and Estate Planning at Sterling Park Financial. Jonah Mayles shares his wisdom derived in the field of tax law as well as insurance, and the often overlooked topic of insurance tracking shares in reference to estate planning. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:16 – Jonah Mayles explains what he does for a living. 

● 02:14 – What is the concept of insurance tracking shares? 

● 03:11 – What are the benefits of insurance tracking shares? 

● 11:00 – How does the tax implication math happen upon death? 

● 13:10 – Can beneficiary children buy shares directly from the estate? 

● 14:07 – They discuss how taxes will be affected by COVID-19. 

● 15:00 – What does the CRA speak to in reference to insurance tracking shares? 

● 16:32 – Has Jonah seen financial arrangements where clients have borrowed from the policy as well? 

● 19:17 – Jonah Mayles shares various use cases that solve several customer dynamics. 

● 22:36 – The two types of lawyers that will always be busy: family lawyers and estate litigators. 


3 Key Points 

1. The cash surrender value of the policy contributes to the value of the fair market value of your shares. 

2. We are headed towards the biggest wealth transfer in history with the Baby Boomer generation dying off. 

3. Insurance is not only great for the client, but the government also gets to receive their money way faster. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “What I do at Sterling Park, my partners are all insurance guys, been in insurance their entire careers, whereas what I do is the tax and estate planning that goes into the insurance plans that we implement for our clients.” – Jonah Mayles 

● “Insurance tracking shares is essentially a class of tracking shares that is created for a corporation that is going to acquire a whole life insurance policy.” – Jonah Mayles 

● (Insurance tracking shares) “What it does is it tracks the value of either the cash surrender value of the policy or the death benefit, or both.” – Jonah Mayles 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – Website 

● Linkedin – Jonah Mayles

● SterlingParkGrp.com – Website for Sterling Park Financial Group 


Full Transcript

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HR Tips and Best Practices with Kevin Kliman | E01811 Jun 202000:40:58

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, talks with Kevin Kliman, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Humi. Humi is an online platform for managing basically everything that has to do with people in your business. Kevin Kliman talks about HR advice, strategies, and pitfalls to avoid for human resources in its relationship to financial planning. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:32 – Kevin Kliman explains what Humi is and the work he does with them. 

● 03:24 – What does hiring people and turnover cost people aside from their salaries? 

● 11:09 – What are some best practices around onboarding that really work effectively and have an impact? 

● 13:21 – Kevin talks about the consequences of not having paperwork taken care of properly. 

● 15:14 – What should employees be doing to address onboarding concerns? 

● 17:22 – Kevin discusses firing people, dismissal and the risks surrounding that. 

● 21:29 – When it comes to payroll, remove all the friction. 

● 25:34 – What are some best practices for onboarding and maintenance of the plans in

general? 

● 38:41 – Trust is earned. 

● 39:17 – Kevin Kliman shares his final thoughts 


3 Key Points 

1. When hiring, make sure you are filtering for company culture fit, use recruiting 

to signal to them what your expectations are, and be authentic. 

2. Build an emotional bond between new employees and the rest of the team. 

3. The Employment Standards Act (ESA) is the bare minimum for companies as 

to how they have to treat employees. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Humi is a cloud-based employee system of record for Canadian businesses with 5 to 500 people. It’s kind of a fancy way of saying that we combine payroll, HR, health benefits into a single simple system, cloud-based system that can be accessed from any device.” – Kevin Kliman 

● (Humi) “We are really replacing paper contracts, Excel spreadsheets, all the multiple siloed systems that people use to manage the people side of their business.” – Kevin Kliman 

● (Humi) “The company is four and a half years old. There are now over 1000 companies that are on Humi and they employ over 30,000 people.” – Kevin Kliman 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – Website 

● Linkedin – Kevin Kliman’s Linkedin 

● Twitter – Kevin Kliman’s Twitter 

● Humi.ca – Website for Humi 

● Kevin@Humi.ca – Email Kevin Kliman 


Full Transcript

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CFIB And Why You Should Join With Ryan Mallough | E017 04 Jun 202000:32:30

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, talks with Ryan Mallough, Director of Provincial Affairs for Ontario at the Canadian Federation of Independent Business. CFIB is the largest advocacy group for small business owners in Canada. Ryan Mallough talks about what CFIB does and why small business owners should consider becoming members. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:13 – Ryan Mallough explains what CFIB does. 

● 04:33 – What have been some of CFIB’s big wins in the past? 

● 11:09 – Aside from COVID-19, what are some of CFIB’s other big advocacy issues currently? 

● 13:21 – They talk about how construction can infringe on businesses. 

● 17:30 – How have they lobbied for businesses affected by COVID-19? 

● 21:28 – What has been the feedback on commercial real estate subsidies? 

● 26:44 – What else does CFIB offer it’s members? 

● 29:16 – What does it cost to join CFIB? 


3 Key Points 

1. CFIB is informed by their 110,000 members’ opinions through regular surveys and mandate questions. 

2. Right now in Canada, it is easier and more lucrative from a tax perspective to sell to a third party than it is to sell to a family member.

 3. CFIB has been pushing for all Canadian governments across the country to start building in construction mitigation programs, including financial compensation for businesses that are disrupted by huge construction projects. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “The Canadian Federation of Independent Business has been around for 49 years now and we represent the big voice for small businesses. We operate across the country. We have offices in all 10 provinces.” – Ryan Mallough 

● “We advocate for things that small businesses are looking for. So, things like reduced small business or corporate tax rates, changes to employment standards law, cutting red tape and regulations, permit signage, that sort of thing.” – Ryan Mallough 

● “How can we help the business owners succeed? How can we make their lives easier when it comes to dealing with the government, while at the same time ensuring that the government understands the realities of running a small business?” – Ryan Mallough 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – Website 

● Linkedin – Ryan Mallough’s Linkedin 

● CFIB.ca – Website for Canadian Federation of Independent Business


Full Transcript

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Tax Implications for Americans Living In Canada with Terry Ritchie | E016 28 May 202000:50:27

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, talks with Terry Richie, Partner and Vice President at Cardinal Point Wealth Management. Cardinal Point is a firm that specializes in dealing with U.S./Canadian cross-border issues. Terry Ritchie discusses tricks and traps that Canadian business owners are exposed to when they are also United States tax residents. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:02 – Terry Ritchie describes what he does in his career. 

● 02:44 – What are U.S. residents for income tax purposes? 

● 05:57 – COVID-19 is affecting ‘snowbirds’ from a tax prospective who can’t travel. 

● 08:42 – You could have zero assets in the U.S. and a U.S. resident living in Canada. But you still have to file your taxes in the United States. 

● 10:10 – Terry Ritchie addresses gift taxes 

● 12:05 – What are the potential penalties for not filing income taxes? 

● 17:38 – If you have interest in Canadian company, what IRS forms need to be filed? 

● 19:22 – What were some of the tax changes when Trump became president? 

● 21:05 – Terry shares the come advice for American clients setting up a business in Canada. 

● 22:29 – What are the differences in homeowner taxes in the US and Canada? 

● 26:26 – Which business industries does it make sense to get incorporated? 

● 28:27 – What are your filing requirements for a corporation? 

● 30:20 – What is one of the big detriments to being an American taxpayer when you are a Canadian business owner? 

● 34:32 – Terry discusses the reasons why it is important to become compliant. 

● 41:50 – How will passports be affected by tax debt? 

● 42:52 – What is the difference between having a green card or when you are actually considered a citizen? 


3 Key Points 

1. There are 9 million Americans that live outside of the United States and just below 1 million Americans that live in Canada. 

2. U.S. residents for income tax purposes are citizens of the U.S. that were born there, those that hold green cards, traditional ‘snowbirds’ who consistently spend generally at least 4 months in the United States for 3 years in a row. 

3. Income that you leave in a foreign entity is taxed at the highest margin rate for U.S. tax purposes. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “‘We’re not just book smart, we live it.’ So, I live in Phoenix and Calgary. We have offices in California, Florida, Phoenix, Toronto, and Calgary. All my kids are dual citizens. I’m married to a U.S. citizen.” – Terry Ritchie 

● “In the U.S., generally more than 90% of the companies in the U.S. are all flow-throughs, tax corporations, S-Corps, LLCs.” – Terry Ritchie 

● “Sometimes, when you make them aware of the way that we tax in the US on the Canadian side, it sometimes it makes sense to just be a sole prop, and just file a good old C-2125 and a scheduled C.” – Terry Ritchie 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – Website 

● Linkedin – Terry Ritchie’s Linkedin 

● Terry@cardinalpointwealth.com – Email Terry Ritchie 

● Linkedin – Terry Ritchie’s Linkedin 

● cardinalpointwealth.com – Website for Cardinal Point Wealth Management 


Full Transcript

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Creditor Protection & Insolvency with Scott Terrio | E01521 May 202000:34:27

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, talks with Scott Terrio, Manager of Consumer Insolvency at Hoyes Michalos. Hoyes Michalos is a Toronto-based license and insolvency trustee. Scott Terrio talks about what insolvency means, what the options are, and how business owners can protect their assets in the event of insolvency. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:15 – Scott Terrio explains the work that he does. 

● 02:55 – What is the process and options for when people get into debt issues? 

● 04:18 – What are consumer proposals? 

● 06:50 – How are consumer proposals different from bankruptcies to the consumer? 

● 10:30 – Business debt is quite different from consumer debt. 

● 13:33 – Can a spouse become liable for their other spouse’s debt? 

● 14:57 – How much back and forth typically happens with consumer proposals? 

● 17:07 – What is normally the timeline differences between consumer proposals and bankruptcy? 

● 19:36 – What if someone goes through a consumer proposal and gets in financial trouble again? 

● 21:08 – What are the misconceptions about bankruptcy in Canada? 

● 24:25 – Which types of assets do creditors not have access to? 

● 27:37 – Consumer debt usually costs you more over time. 

● 28:38 – What do RESPs, TFSAs, RDSPs look like in a credit situation? 

● 30:23 – Which bankruptcy programs are relevant to this COVID-19 moment? 


3 Key Points 

1. Hoyes Michalos is a Toronto-based license and insolvency trustee firm with 25 offices across Ontario, Canada and did about 5800 files last year. 

2. Consumer proposals are for individuals, not a business, with $250,000 in unsecured debt or less, and are making an agreement to pay a percentage of your debt. 

3. About 70% of consumer proposals go through as offered and about 99.9% co ahead with a counter-offer. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Sooner is always better when you are talking about debt. Most small business owners, once they’ve gotten into a little bit of trouble, whether it is tax debt or supplier debt or bank debt, they keep digging.” – Scott Terrio 

● “What a proposal actually is, is you are making a legal settlement with all of your unsecured creditors as a group, through a trustee, through the courts.” – Scott Terrio 

● “You file a bankruptcy, you get an R9 rating for 6 years after your bankruptcy discharge. So, that is either 9 months or 21. The R9 isn’t as bad as people think, because I’ve had all kinds of people get mortgages.” – Scott Terrio 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – Website 

● sterrio@hoyes.com – Email Scott Terrio 

● Linkedin – Scott Terrio’s Linkedin 

● Twitter – Scott Terrio’s Twitter 

● hoyes.com – Website for Hoyes Michalos


Full Transcript

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Business Mortgage Lending with Sheldon Brow | E01414 May 202000:24:30

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, talks with Sheldon Brow, Independent Mortgage Broker. Sheldon Brow talks about how mortgage lending and debt in general work differently for business owners than they do for the average consumer. He also provides guidance and tips on how to make your life easier as a business owner when you need to apply for debt. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:12 – Sheldon Brow describes what he does in his career. 

● 02:44 – Why do business owners have such a hard time getting mortgages? 

● 05:53 – Why are independent mortgage brokers such a beneficial option? 

● 04:20 – What does the approach to applying for debt look like? 

● 10:12 – The vast amount of financial training is unfortunately focused on sales. 

● 11:20 – What are his best practices to make access to credit easier for business owner clients? 

● 14:17 – Sheldon talks about various types of business loans that people commonly need to take out. 

● 21:25 – For business lending, it is really helpful to have big, extensive contracts with big companies, reliable cash flow, assets, and invoices that you have coming in. 


3 Key Points 

1. Among the plethora of business mortgage lending, some of the variables 

include not just credit scores, but also debt-service coverage ratio. 

2. Seek a long-term relationship with your broker with an ecosystem of financial 

experts, not just a transactional situation. 

3. The better you know your client, the better you can advise. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “I broker mortgages. I am able to shop across more than 30 different lenders and many, many different types of products for both personal and business lending.” – Sheldon Brow 

● (Business lending) “A lot of people think you just need a good credit score, and that is a huge misconception.” – Sheldon Brow 

● “Why brokers are better in every level of finance, in my opinion, is because they’re not just giving the kind of tunnel vision of what is appropriate at that bank.” – Sheldon Brow 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – Jason Pereira Website 

● sheldonbrow.com – Website for Sheldon Brow 

● Linkedin – Sheldon Brow

● Call Sheldon Brow – (902)440-2663 


Full Transcript

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Trusts with Lee Fernandes | E01307 May 202000:46:03

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, talks with Lee Fernandes, Senior Wealth Consultant at Cidel. Cidel is a company that helps high-wealth Canadians establish structures and planning to help them meet their needs. Lee Fernandes discusses one of Cidel’s core offerings, trust services. This episode provides a general education on what trusts are, how they can be used, common use cases, and why they are beneficial to people. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:12 – Lee Fernandes describes what Cidel is and does. 

● 01:53 – What is a trust? 

● 03:28 – Jason Pereira provides a simple example of an irrevocable trust. 

● 04:20 – They discuss the perception of trusts being scandalous. 

● 06:31 – Lee discusses asset protection trusts. 

● 09:09 – What questions do Lee’s clients often have? 

● 11:51 – Lee clarifies the trustees’ and settlers’ duties. 

● 18:17 – How many trustees should you have? 

● 22:11 – What is a graduated real estate (GRE)? 

● 25:22 – What are the advantages and disadvantages of inheriting? 

● 30:53 – Henson Trust is only available to beneficiaries that have disabled needs. 

● 33:33 – What are spousal trusts, alter ego Trusts, and foundations? 

● 40:00 – Individuals try to set up a private foundation after the beginning August, it’s not going to happen that year. 

● 43:58 – Trusts are very useful tools that can be very dynamic. 


3 Key Points 

1. The three certainties that a trust needs to meet is the certainty of intent, 

certainty of subject matter (what), and the certainty of object (for who). 

2. Trusts come down to wealth protection and control versus taxation. 

3. Trusts now pay the highest marginal tax rate in Canada. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Cidel is a Canadian-based global financial services company. We are a private bank, so we deal with private clients, both globally and domestic, and the objective is really to work with families to preserve wealth.” – Lee Fernandes 

● “If you are setting up a structure, and the true intent of that trust is to asset protect, then look at a different jurisdiction. An asset protection trust doesn’t cross any tax lines. It is tax-neutral.” – Lee Fernandes 

● “‘What is it that I need to have to qualify for a trust?’ And it isn’t really about net worth. It is around, what do you need to have the trust for? Let’s have a more meaningful discussion around the use of a trust.” – Lee Fernandes 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – Website

● Linkedin – Lee Fernandes’s

● cidel.com – Website for Cidel 


Full Transcript

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Venture Capital with Stephanie Choo | E01230 Apr 202000:33:16

In this episode of ​Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, talks with Stephanie Choo, Partner and Head of Investments at Portag3 Ventures. Portag3 Ventures is a venture capital firm that specifically invests within the fintech financial technology space. Stephanie Choo explains what venture capitalists are, how to approach them, what they are looking for, and how to know if you are someone who should be taking on venture capital. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:14 – Stephanie Choo describes what Portag3 Ventures does. 

● 03:03 – ​What is a venture capital firm? 

● 05:38 – What would make a business not be a good fit for a VC? 

● 09:31 – Portag3 Ventures are looking for 10x returns or more on their investment. 

● 11:18 – Stephanie talks about the automated pizza business play. 

● 13:05 – What are VCs typically looking for in businesses to show them to convince them to invest? 

● 18:42 – Stephanie explains what they want to see in a business’ team and their innovation. 

● 23:38 – Be able to prove what is proprietary, protected, or defensible about your product or service. 

● 25:30 – When a VC is ready to invest, what is a term sheet, and what goes into that? 

● 28:12 – What are other misconceptions about venture capital firms that businesses should be aware of? 


3 Key Points 

1. Venture capital firms are sources of capital for certain early stage businesses that are very high growth that are generally technology orientated and scalable, typically with a venture portfolio approach. 

2. Venture capital may not be for you if you are a cash-generating cash-flowing business that is not particularly scalable and not growing by 100% or more a year that doesn’t have an exit

strategy and isn’t planning to return capital in about 10 years. 

3. Most venture funds look at the strength of a company’s team, why now is the right time for this business, and what problem does the business solve. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Portag3 is a global fintech-specific venture fund. We invest across seed Series A and Series B. But, we’re really looking for companies in the fintech space that are going to transform the future of financial services.” – Stephanie Choo 

● “We typically invest at the stage where companies have what is called ‘early market fit,’ which means they have early traction. They’ve got customers. They’ve got some revenue.” – Stephanie Choo 

● “They are investing on what is called the ‘power law basis,’ which is a very small number of your portfolio will end up generating 90% or plus returns for you.” – Stephanie Choo 


Resources Mentioned: 

●​ ​Facebook​ – Jason Pereira’s 

●​ ​LinkedIn​ – Jason Pereira’s

●​ ​FintechImpact.co​ – Website

●​ ​jasonpereira.ca​ – Website 

● ​Linkedin​ – Stephanie Choo’s 

● ​P3vc.com​ – Website Portag3


Full Transcript

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Family Coaching with Alex Kirby | E11007 Sep 202300:35:47

Jason talks to Alex Kirby, Co-Founder and CEO of Total Family Management. It is a company focused on family coaching and helping families through the dynamics and personalities that are in the family to create better cohesion and better family Wellness and long-term satisfaction for everybody. They explore the challenges of entitlement within family businesses and how purpose can be used to unify the family's values and goals. It also touches on the initial steps of onboarding with Total Family Management.


Episode Highlights:

  • 4.12: Jason wants to know how family dynamics change as young families evolve into families with teenagers and adults, and ultimately as the older generation, the patriarchs and matriarchs, transition into their senior years.
  • 4.38: Alex outlines his approach to classifying people into four distinct life stages like the wonder segment, the balance segment, the harmony segment, the wisdom or legacy segment within families and these stages are akin to being sorted into different houses like in Hogwarts.
  • 6.45: Alex highlights that having a clarified vision is crucial for a sense of direction and well-being, regardless of one's age or life stage.
  • 13.18 Alex says, maintaining a healthy, normal relationship with adult children and transitioning from a parenting role to a more peer-like relationship is an important challenge that needs to be addressed over an extended period.
  • 29:02: Alex discusses the concept of passing on values and how purpose can be a unifying factor in families, especially in the context of family businesses.
  • 32:02: Alex discusses the process of engaging with Total Family Management and outlines the steps clients typically go through to make the most of their time with the service.
  • 34:04: Alex emphasizes the authenticity of their company and how everyone in their organization goes through the processes they advocate for, ensuring that they practice what they preach.


3 Key Points:

  1. Jason and Alex discuss the challenges faced by business owners, especially when it comes to succession planning and family dynamics within the business.
  2. Jason highlights several challenges and complexities that arise in family businesses when it comes to succession planning.
  3. Total Family Management offers a transparent and straightforward process for clients to engage with their coaching services, with a focus on providing ongoing support and flexibility to address family dynamics effectively.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • “Waiting until the final stage to address important family dynamic and communication issues may not be the most effective approach.” – Jason
  • “Parents often possess the answers to the questions asked during the coaching sessions but may not have explored them before. The goal is to create a safe space for discussing important family matters. “- Alex
  • “If parents care enough to participate in a conversation or coaching session about their children, it demonstrates a significant commitment, which is a crucial step in addressing family dynamics.” - Jason


Resources Mentioned:

  • Facebook – Jason Pereira's Facebook
  • LinkedIn – Jason Pereira's LinkedIn
  • https://totalfamily.io/offer


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Credit Ratings and Alternative Lending with Cato Pastol | E01123 Apr 202000:44:07

Summary:

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Cato Pastoll, CEO at Lending Loop, an alternative lender to small businesses. Cato Pastoll talks about personal and business credit ratings as well as his work at Lending Loop. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 00:39 – Jason Pereira introduces Cato Pastoll. 

● 01:00 – Cato Pastoll describes who he is and what he does. 

● 01:50 – What are personal credit scores, how do you get them, and what impacts them? 

● 05:50 – What is a healthy credit utilization amount? 

● 08:48 – Payday loans can hurt your credit more than loan-term bank loans. 

● 09:38 – What are the differences between a soft hit and a hard hit to your credit score? 

● 11:31 – The length of your borrowing history also affects your credit score? 

● 13:18 – What advice does Cato have for people to maintain a good credit score? 

● 15:53 – Check for errors on your credit report. 

● 16:30 – Have accounts and credit cards with different banks and lenders. 

● 18:23 – What goes into a corporate credit score and how does it differ from personal credit scores? 

● 21:20 – What is firmographic data? 

● 22:32 – Businesses that have liens against them represent risk to lenders. 

● 26:15 – Collections and judgements do come into play on corporate credit scores. 

● 28:43 – Lending Loop is the first of its kind in Canada. 

● 31:22 – Lending Loop helps businesses establish credit and sources of financing. 

● 32:27 – How do they onboard people and provide them with information on quotes? 

● 34:50 – Lending Loop is handling loans from anywhere between $5000-$500,000. 

● 35:14 – Their interest rates range from 5.9%-26.5%. 

● 36:33 – How much can lenders offer a business and what is the process? 

● 38:38 – Cato Pastoll discusses Lender Loop’s proprietary risk score. 


3 Key Points 

1. The 5 factors that impact your personal credit score are payment history, 

utilization amount, credit history, inquiries, and the length of your borrowing history. 

2. Set up pre-scheduled credit card payments to prevent being late. 

3. Keep credit utilization under 35%. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Lending Loop is an online marketplace lending platform. What we do is connect small businesses that are looking for an affordable source of financing with investors that want to lend money to their businesses.” – Cato Pastoll 

● “Being diligent with your payments, it’s not just going to help your credit score, it is actually going to help when lenders or other people look at your credit report. Is this someone who is reliable?” – Cato Pastoll 

● “A lot of business owners when they get started will either borrow against their personal home equity or they will borrow on personal credit cards, and that actually doesn’t necessarily benefit their business credit.” – Cato Pastoll 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – Website

● Linkedin – Cato Pastoll’s Linkedin 

● lendingloop.ca – Website for Lending Loop 

● getloop.ca – Free Personal and Business Credit Scores from LendingLoop 


Full Transcript

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Canada’s COVID-19 Economic Response Plan with Guy Anderson | E01016 Apr 202000:36:55

Summary:

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, talks with Guy Anderson, Full-Licensed Investment and Financial Planner with Aligned Capital about Canada’s response plan to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:24 – Guy Anderson introduces himself and what he does 

● 01:50 – They go over the first category of benefits for businesses: avoiding layoffs and rehiring employees. 

● 05:05 – What is involved in the ‘extending the workshare program’? 

● 06:09 – The temporary changes to the Canada Summer Jobs Program 

● 07:04 – Reduced and Deferred Payments refers to income taxes and sales remittances. 

● 07:34 – Jason Pereira explains the Business Credit Availability Program and the Canada Emergency Business Account. 

● 09:58 – Many business owners don’t qualify for some subsidy programs because pay themselves in dividends. 

● 10:34 – The Launching an Insured Mortgage Purchase Program is up to $150 billion dollars. 

● 11:46 – The Bank of Canada is creating some liquidity in the housing market. 

● 13:55 – The Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions has lowered the domestic stability buffer by a point and a quarter. 

● 16:27 – Jason goes over the tax deferrals for the self-employed and industries that were hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic. 

● 18:22 – Industries that have been set back by COVID-19 include airports, agriculture, food distribution, job placement and recruiting, and the film Industry. 

● 19:39 – The government has planned support for individuals and families, including the increase to the Canada Child Benefit. 

● 22:32 – Jason and Guy discuss mortgage support. 

● 24:50 – The Indigenous Community Support Fund is of $305 million. 

● 26:40 – What is the Reaching Home Initiative, and the support for living shelters? 

● 28:13 – What types of support is being provided for mental health and for seniors? 

● 33:07 – What programs are assisting students and recent graduates? 

● 34:38 – Every province in Canada has their own support nuances. 

● 35:38 – Kind.Wealth.ca has organized pro-bono initiative of independent financial planners who are offering their services for free to people in need. 

● 36:38 – Cato 


3 Key Points 

1. The government will cover up to 75% of wages for up to 12 weeks, up to a threshold of up to around $58,000. 

2. The Canadian government has extended the tax filing deadline and the tax payment deadlines can be deferred until August 31st. 

3. The Bank of Canada has dropped interest rates to about 25 basis points. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “The amounts that they are covering, the 15%, that seems fair because for the period that they are talking about. Most businesses probably didn’t see the drop off right away. So, 15% seems fair.” – Guy Anderson 

● “Anyone that hires a student under the Canada Summer Jobs Program will basically receive 100% of the minimum wage in the province they are in, covered. So, I got to tell you, I’m very much looking forward to hiring an army of students.” – Jason Pereira 

● (Canada Emergency Business Account) “It is a line of credit of $40,000 for basically an interest-free line of credit. This one is very interesting. It is interest-free for the first year.” – Jason Pereira 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – J. Pereira’s Website 

● Linkedin – Guy Anderson’s Linkedin 

● KindWealth.ca – Website for Kind Wealth - Pro-Bono COVID-19 services. 


Full Transcript

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Post Mortem Planning with Trevor Parry | E00909 Apr 202000:27:49

Summary:

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Trevor Parry, President of TRP Strategy Group and Tax and Estate Expert. Trevor Parry discusses the ins and outs of post-mortem planning to prepare for what happens to the investments in your holding company after you pass away. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 00:47 – Jason Pereira introduces Trevor Parry. 

● 01:35 – Trevor Parry describes who he is and what he does. 

● 02:16 – They talk about what happens to investments when the owner of a holdings company passes away. 

● 06:22 – What is a loss carry-back and pipeline transactions? 

● 09:28 – How could a corporation essentially be double taxed? 

● 13:44 – Capital dividends have no relevance in a pipeline. 

● 16:24 – What is a spousal role and redeem? 

● 18:31 – How can you reduce the cost of insurance through leverage? 

● 22:38 – They aren’t going to get rid of capital dividend credits. 

● 23:50 – Post mortem planning can be made understandable but not simple. 

● 25:01 – United States rules regarding permanent life insurance are very different from Canada’s. 


3 Key Points 

1. Deemed dividends will be taxed as an ineligible dividend, a non-eligible dividend, or a little of both. 

2. Post-mortem planning options include loss carry backs, share redemptions, pipeline transactions, and also a mixture that involves life insurance. 

3. What is your gut sense of risk? 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “I am the self-described tax mercenary. So, I am a lawyer by training, collecting a few tax degrees over the past few years and I have a religious devotion to helping entrepreneurs prudently and safely save money.” – Trevor Parry 

● “Corporations are legal persons. They survive you. So, though the value of your shares now has been counted in your terminal return, assuming no roll-over, you still have to do with, or your estate has to do with that corporation.” – Trevor Parry 

● “Canada, without a doubt, has the positive rules and regulations in the G7 when it comes to permanent life insurance.” – Trevor Parry 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact 

● jasonpereira.ca – Jason Pereira’s

● trevorparry.com – TRP Strategy Group 

● Trevor@trevorparry.com - Trevor Parry’s Email 


Full Transcript

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Cyber Insurance with Greg Markell | E00802 Apr 202000:49:05

Summary:

In the 4th episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host of the podcast Fintech Impact, welcomes Greg Markell of Ridge Canada, a cyber security insurance firm. They discuss the origins of cyber insurance, how to protect yourself and your business from breaches, and more. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:06: – Ridge Canada is a wholesale underwriting shop that focuses on cyber and privacy liability insurance. 

● 01:36: – Cyber security is quite new, but it can cover measures to avoid liability for breaches or to solve the problem, and can cover the liability itself in the event that you’re sued. 

● 06:04: – One of the biggest issues right now is understanding cyber connectivity across the country. 

● 06:47: – We’re about halfway up the learning curve for brokers being able to communicate to end clients what their policies can do and how to use it. 

● 08:02: – A Canadian census by Stats Canada of small businesses in the country actually asked for the purchasing rates of cyber insurance and it was only 7% as of 2017. 

● 10:58: – Canada is the first country to have federal notification legislation mandating that companies notify their customers when there’s been a privacy breach. 

● 15:26: – 40-50% of the applicants they see are indicating some form of loss, mostly from ransomware. 

● 18:42: – You don’t need to be an obvious target to be hit with ransomware. 

● 22:20: – Awareness is key to avoiding cybersecurity threats, including employee training. 

● 26:45: – Two-factor authentication and password strength are crucial, and you can use technology like LastPass and other password managers to make it easy. 

● 28:46: – There are multiple versions of two-factor authentication, including built-in authentication in Office365. 

● 30:03: – Authentication where you are texted a code is the weakest form; even Jack Dorsey’s Twitter account was hacked by duping his phone’s SIM card. 

● 34:30: – The strongest option is a physical USB key. 

● 44:32: – Greg’s number one tip is to have a disaster recovery plan that includes getting hit by ransomware. 


3 Key Points 

1. Every business that has ever collected payment information from customers is at risk of 

a cyber security and privacy breach. 

2. Ransomware or malware are as big a threat as standard data breaches. 

3. Never think you’re immune or not at risk of being hit with ransomware or a breach. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “The bottom line is if you take any form of client data and that data ever touches anything but a piece of paper, and that piece of paper isn’t shredded, you’re at some form of cybersecurity risk.” –Jason Pereira 

● “I think there’s a lot of strength to the cloud, it’s how you manage things within the cloud. Always always always, if you’re using cloud-based technology, two-factor authentication, it’s a must.” –Greg Markell 

● “Make sure you have that instant response plan in a robust manner and so you’ve identified the lawyer that you're going to call who’s an expert in these types of scenarios because your general lawyer is not going to know how to get Bitcoin.” –Greg Markell 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Website – Jason Pereira’s Website 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● Jason’s article about RCAs 

● Ridge Canada website – https://www.ridgecanada.insure/ 

● Email Greg: gmarkell@ridgecanada.com 

● Call Greg: 416-646-6239


Full Transcript

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Insurance Planning for Business with Zachary Goldman | E00726 Mar 202000:46:14

Summary:

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Zak Goldman, Managing Partner of Sterling Park Financial Group in Toronto, Canada. Sterling Park is one of the more better-known high-end insurance operations in Canada. Zak and Jason discuss why business owners need to consider insurance and the key benefits of it. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:25: – Zak Goldman introduces himself and what he does. 

● 07:20: – Zak talks about some of the frustrations with the insurance Industry. 

● 09:44: – Sterling Park has seven people in their office which isn’t usual for an insurance firm. 

● 11:23: – Insurance will be a tool to do financial planning. 

● 14:26: – The vast majority of investment advisors are giving incorrect advice. 

● 15:24: – Why does insurance work? 

● 16:58: – Large tax bills often can’t be paid because the liquidity isn’t available. 

● 19:07: – What are some of the basic use cases for insurance for business owners? 

● 19:52: – The most common and easiest use of insurance is for a partnership. 

● 23:33: – Why is insurance and tax planning so important for when you die? 

● 27:30: – Insurance in a corporation is not to be used for an insured retirement plan. 

● 32:18: – Make sure whoever is doing your financial planning are doing comparisons. 

● 35:00: – Provide value to your client. 

● 38:26: – Insurance policies can be tax shelters while you are alive. 

● 41:08: – Corporate capital grows tax-free and at death gets paid out tax-free. 

● 43:30: – At Sterling Park, you can’t take the corporate asset and get a personal loan against it. 


3 Key Points 

1. The average insurance advisor in Canada is $37,000-$49,000 in gross income that they have to run their business out of. 

2. Insurance is a payment that happens on a periodic basis that leads to a much larger payment later on that is tax-free. 

3. Zak Goldman says that Insurance is benefitting two groups: widows and orphans. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “If we can open people’s eyes to insurance and not that cheesy, salesy way, but actually a factual number-based analysis. That’s why we do it and I think that’s why we have success in doing it.” – Zak Goldman 

● “This industry doesn’t hold itself up to the standards that it should. People do not have the expertise, the backgrounds, the letters behind their name.” – Zak Goldman 

● “Tax and mortality. Those are two things that make insurance work.” – Zak Goldman 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s 

● FintechImpact.co – Website

● jasonpereira.ca – Website

● Linkedin – Zak Goldman’s 

● Sterlingparkgrp.com – Website

● Linkedin – Sterling Park Financial Group


Full Transcript

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Mentorship And Grooming The Next Generation With Peter Merrick | E00619 Mar 202000:46:59

Summary: 

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Peter Merrick, Financial Expert that has been in the industry a very long time and is the author of the book The King of Main Street. His book discusses business owners at different stages of life and the value of mentorship between them. Peter Merrick talks about life beyond working on and at your own business. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:09 – Peter Merrick has been in the financial service industry since 1991. 

● 01:48 – Peter discusses his book The King of Main Street and why it is important to business owners. 

● 03:45 – What was the catalyst for writing this book? 

● 14:40 – Jason and Peter discuss the increasing retirement age and the life expectancy age increasing. 

● 16:53 – What are the best practices for moving into retirement age? 

● 19:29 – Why is divorce with retired couples increasing? 

● 25:00 – Why shouldn’t you have kids if you want to be super wealthy? 

● 27:33 – Usually after three generations a family’s inherited money is gone. 

● 32:04: – How should you address the second half of your life’s story? 

● 39:45: – Jason talks about advanced life planning. 

● 41:19: – We need much more mentorship in our society. 

● 45:14: – Focus on your legacy and address what you are doing to make that happen. 


3 Key Points 

1. Peter Merrick has written three textbooks and 800 published articles. 

2. A true mentor is aware of recognizing the person that needs help and to know what we know, and they can see beyond their physical existence and cares about the future. 3. By 2030 it is being predicted that there will be 1.5 billion people over the age of 65. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “I don’t call it The King of Bay Street or The King of Wall Street. It is the average person. It is the millionaire next door. The person who has an idea, gets the capital, organizes it and makes it happen.” – Peter Merrick 

● “There is a saying, the difference between the eater and the eaten is time.” – Peter Merrick 

● “There is no ransom you can pay to God. So, it is really about the relationships you have and what you have given.” – Peter Merrick 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s 

● FintechImpact.co – Website 

● jasonpereira.ca – Website 

● Linkedin – Peter Merrick’s 

● Thekingofmainstreet.com–The King of Main St. book 


Full Transcript

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An Introduction to Employee Benefits with Keith Foot | E00512 Mar 202001:04:55

Summary:

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Keith Foot, CEO of Ralph Moss Insurance. Jason Pereira and Keith Foot discuss employee benefit plans, the different components of the plans, and tips on how you can contain cost. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:00: – Keith Foot introduces himself and what he does. 

● 01:41: – What are the reasons for group employee benefits? 

● 03:53: – What is the cost of setting up a group employee benefit? 

● 04:58: – What kinds of ‘target loss ratios’ can companies be looking at? 

● 12:04: – People need more than what is offered through a group insurance plan. 

● 15:22: – How does accidental death and dismemberment insurance work? 

● 19:48: – Who is paying for these employee benefits? 

● 23:27: – How does dental insurance factor into group employee benefits? 

● 31:28: – What is involved in extended insurance plans and reimbursements? 

● 37:02: – Keith Foot’s company audits the claims of their clients every year. 

● 41:41: – There is a period of stability required before traveling with travel insurance. 

● 44:48: – What can employee assistance programs, spending accounts and wellness accounts look like? 

● 53:15: – What is the benefit versus cost for vision care? 

● 57:36: – There are fewer and fewer stop-less providers that are willing to ensure a stand-alone self-insured plan. 

● 1:00:53: – So many employers don’t know the cost of their employee insurance benefits. 


3 Key Points 

1. Keith Foot is seeing group employee benefits as averaging about 10% of payroll. In real dollars to an employee it comes to about $3000-$4000 per year for a benefit program with life, accidental death and dismemberment, some form of disability, some health and some dental. 2. Dependent life benefits are adjunct plans to the employee benefits that are 

usually around $5000 for a child and $10,000 for a spouse. 

3. The various tiers of dental insurance are basic dental for x-rays and 

cleanings, level two that covers fillings and levels three and four which are crowns and bridges. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Any dollar that the employers pays out in benefits, is a total write-off to the company and the employee gets the benefit tax-free, with the exception of life insurance where there is a tax on the premium.” – Keith Foot 

● “Our job as a consultant is to allow the insurance company to make money, because if they don’t make money, we don't have anyone to ensure our clients or to ensure our companies. – Keith Foot 

● “The thing with group life insurance to remember is it is not portable. When an employee leaves, if he has $100,000 of coverage and he leaves the company, it is gone.” – Keith Foot 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s 

● FintechImpact.co – Website

● jasonpereira.ca – Website 

● Linkedin – Keith Foot’s 

● RalphMoss.ca – Website


Full Transcript

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IPPs & RCAs with Fraser Lang | E00405 Mar 202000:42:18
Going beyond RRSPs when planning for retirement.

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Fundamentals of Corporate Taxation with Kim Moody | E00327 Feb 202000:28:45

Summary:

In this episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Kim Moody, Director of Canadian Tax Advisory Services at Moodys Gartner Tax Law in the Calgary area. Kim Moody talks about the expertise that Moody Gartner offers, the general percentages of taxation that businesses face, the differences in paying dividends and salaries, the Kiddie Tax rule, and what to know before paying family members. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:07: – Kim Moody explains Moodys Gartner and what they do. 

● 02:05: – How are corporations taxed in Canada? 

● 03:47: – What is the tax benefit of not taking money out personally against the business? 

● 05:09: – Kim talks about the limit of $50,000 in passive income. 

● 08:38: – Why is the belief that paying dividends is better than paying income a fallacy? 

● 12:00: – Corporations are giving up their CPT contributions if they are paying out dividends and giving up the ability to earn RST. 

● 13:26: – What does it take to pay a salary or dividend to a family member? 

● 15:37: – How have the rules changed for paying dividends to family members? 

● 20:15: – Kim Moody talks about the Kiddie Tax rule. 

● 22:13: – The average business owner makes less than $70,000 a year to take care of their families and generally work more than a 40-hour work week. 

● 26:06: – It is not about being careful what you wish for, it is about what is best for the country. 


3 Key Points 

1. Moodys Gartner has a very strong Canada-United States bench handling 

anything in the cross borner private client space, with offices in Toronto, Edmonton, Calgary, 

2. Corporations are taxes on active business income, generated in Canada, then the first $500,000 is subject to a preferential rate which varies by province but is typically 10%. Anything over that is taxed at the general rate between 25-27%. 

3. There is a limit of $50,000 in passive income that a small business can make before it starts to potentially suffer because they will pull back on the ability to use the lower tax rate. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Moodys Gartner is a tax law firm. We also have a companion accounting firm, Moody's Private Client and we service private clients, high net worth and ultra high net worth private clients at a tax specialist level.” – Kim Moody 

● “Maximize the referral by not taking those funds out so that ultimately you maximize and use the time value of money so when you ultimately do take the money out and pay another level of personal tax, you are dealing with more” – Kim Moody 

● “Would you pay an arm’s length person the same amount of money for the same services? If the answer is yes, then more than likely that salary that you are paying to the family member is reasonable, then all is well.” – Kim Moody 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s 

● jasonpereira.ca – Jason Pereira’s 

● Linkedin – KimMoody 

● moodystax.com – Moodys Gartner Tax Law 

● FintechImpact.co – Website


Full Transcript

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Family Succession Planning with Tom Deans | E00220 Feb 202000:47:31

Summary:

In the 2nd episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host of the podcast Fintech Impact, welcomes Dr. Tom Deans, estate and family succession planning expert and author of NY Times Bestseller Every Family’s Business, to talk about how to handle exit planning with your business, especially when family succession is involved. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:29: – Tom shares his background and how he ended up working in his family’s business. 

● 03:20: – Only 20% of business owners sell their business. 

● 03:40: – Tom’s fundamental idea is that you shouldn’t gift your business to your children, but sell it to them at full market value. 

● 06:00: – It’s impractical and damaging to teach your kids to expect that the only way they’ll have control over their finances and relationship to the family business is to wait for their parents to die. 

● 08:40: – Every time Tom hears a story of family business drama across industries and around the world, he has heard it before; these are universal patterns. 

● 10:09: – Gifting voting shares to the next generation makes it difficult for them to innovate inside the business; because they didn’t pay for it, they don’t feel they have the authentic permission to change or alter it but instead preserve it. 

● 11:45: – Shift your perspective from preserving the business itself to preserving wealth. 

● 13:15: – Very successful dynastic families like the Rockefellers taught their children about risk taking, the successes and failures, and to love business broadly instead of loving their family’s specific business. 

● 16:15: – Question 1: What does our family business look like in 5 years? 

● 18:12: – Question 2: Are you interested in selling your stock? If yes, to whom? 

● 19:43: – Because people are living longer, succession planning is just getting delayed. 

● 22:06: – Question 3: Are you interested in buying stock and acquiring control, yes or no? 

● 22:42: – Question 4: Do you understand and agree that in order to maximize shareholder value, this business can be sold to a third party at any time? 

● 25:30: – People think their business is their legacy, but people don’t even know the name of who founded Coca-Cola. 

● 26:36: – Question 5: I agree that within 60 days I will put in place special compensation for my child/key employee in the event that the business is sold in the next 5 years. 

● 28:42: – Question 6: As a fundamental principle, I understand that from time to time, people receive unsolicited offers from a third party to acquire the business. These offers will be considered and accepted at the discretion of the controlling shareholder. 

● 29:47: – Question 7: In preparation for the annual update of this blueprint, I will arrange for an updated valuation of the business and calculate whether there is an appropriate amount of insurance in place. I will furnish evidence that this has been done, and the estate taxes will not impair the ability of this corporation to function after my death. 

● 32:00: – When a business fails after children inherit it, we all rush to judgment and blame the next generation, when really it was the responsibility of the business owner to establish a transition plan. 

● 35:27: – Question 8: What are at least three items in each of the following four categories that could affect the health of your business for the next five years? Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. 

● 36:26: – Question 9: To secure our future prosperity together, should we either A) continue to run the business and invest more money into our company, or B) practically pursue the sale of our company? 

● 38:22: – Question 10: Within 60 days of completing this blueprint, you will complete a salary and bonus compensation review. 

● 38:35: – Many business owners will complete a salary review for everyone but their children, and they’re just as often underpaid and exploited as they are overpaid. 

● 40:30: – Question 11: I agree to conduct an annual performance review. 

● 40:48: – Even your children need performance reviews in order to feel ownership over the business. 

● 41:25: – Question 12: Within 60 days of completing this blueprint, I will present an up to date job description to all family members/key employees working in the business that clearly describes their duties and responsibilities. 

● 43:10: – When selling a business, the buyer often wants things like organizational charts and job descriptions, and the only way you’ll get top dollar on the sale of your business is if you have those things ready. 

● 43:43: – In business, you really make your money on your way out, not along the way. 


3 Key Points 

1. Not everyone wants to take over their family’s business, so these questions are 

designed to make sure you have both a willing seller and a willing buyer. 

2. The responsibility for a smooth, successful transition is on the business owner, not their 

children. 

3. Treating your children like fully valued employees is crucial for their long-term 

involvement and dedication to the company. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “What happens is the previous generation designs, quite unwittingly, the business to fail in the hands of the next generation. It’s not their desire, but gifting the voting shares makes it very difficult for the next generation to innovate inside the business.” –Tom Deans 

● “The next gen, when they have their own ideas, and many of those visions for the five years are in contrast with the controlling shareholder, the parent, that’s not a problem, that’s an opportunity.” –Tom Deans 

● “Starting from a pool of thousands of resumes, you’re telling me in a family business, from a pool of two kids, the statistical likelihood that you’re gonna find the best CEO for that business?” –Tom Deans 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Website – Jason Pereira’s Website 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● Every Family’s Business by Dr. Tom Deans


Full Transcript

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AI Guides with John Stroud | E10913 Jul 202300:35:11

Jason Pereira interviews John Stroud, the CEO of AI Guides, an AI strategy and consulting company. The episode focuses on artificial intelligence, particularly generative AI, and how it can benefit businesses of all sizes, including single-person operations. The conversation explores various options available in the AI space to improve business operations.


Episode Highlights

  • 00:43: John Stroud explains that AI Guides help organizations harness the power of artificial intelligence, specifically focusing on generative AI. He mentions that AI can benefit businesses of all sizes, even single-person operations, and there are various options available to improve business processes.
  • 01:53: AI, particularly ChatGPT, is a hot topic and mentions its significant impact on technology. John highlights how ChatGPT quickly captured everyone's imagination and compares its impact to previous revolutionary technologies like the iPhone.
  • 02:48: ChatGPT's impact has made artificial intelligence a hot topic in technology.
  • 11:21 John explains how users can fine-tune the AI model with their own data for specific answers.
  • 11:40: Jason and John mention using AI-powered tools like Chat GPT in Google Docs and Microsoft Office for writing blog posts, letters, and other documents. He emphasizes the time-saving benefits of these tools and how they can be easily implemented without intimidation.
  • 15:48: John suggests treating the exploration of AI as a science experiment and considering the opportunities while managing the potential risks.
  • 16:37: If someone wants to expand their use of AI, they can consider seeking outside help for advice, says John.
  • 17:26: John mentions a system called "PDF or chat PDF" where PDFs can be uploaded, and questions can be asked.
  • 18:35: John mentions the possibility of OpenAI developing more private containers for protecting information.
  • 19:45 John discusses foundational steps and what people should be aware of before starting their AI journey.
  • 24:00: John raises the topic of prompts and their importance in AI.
  • 29:35: John advises staying ahead of the rapid pace of AI development and starting with small improvements.
  • 30:31: John emphasizes the need for continuous learning and adapting to new tools and technologies.


3 Key Points

  1. John and Jason discuss the potential risks, costs, and consequences of AI projects that are not properly planned or supported by the necessary infrastructure.
  2. John and Jason explain how generative AI has made AI more accessible and easier to implement, addressing some of the challenges related to data stewardship and system integration.
  3. There is a government grant in Canada that provides funding for digital strategies, making it easier for companies to explore AI opportunities.


Tweetable Quotes

  • "Chat GPT can be a helpful resource in understanding AI and its applications." - John
  • "Open AI is going to allow for more private containers where you make sure that your information will be protected." - John
  • "You are creating a digital strategy. So, for companies that have a $500,000 in revenue. They probably qualify for this grant, and that gives them $15,000 towards the preparation of this strategy. So, if you got a hunch about how you might be able to use AI, then the vast majority of the cost is covered through a grant." - John


Resources Mentioned


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Incorporation & Corporate Structure Planning with Ted Maduri | E00113 Feb 202000:36:05

Summary:

In the first episode of Financial Planning for Canadian Business Owners, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host of the podcast Fintech Impact, welcomes Ted Maduri, Partner at the law firm DLA Piper, to talk about how to establish a strong business structure from the start, challenges people may face along the way, and more. 


Episode Highlights: 

● 01:53: – From a legal standpoint, the easiest way to start a business is through a sole proprietorship or a general partnership if you have a business partner. 

● 02:50: – Registering as a business allows you to have a brand and a name, allows you to enter into contracts and then sue on the basis of those contracts, and allows you to deduct business expenses. 

● 03:50: – You are not locked into a business structure forever; you can begin as a sole proprietorship and become a corporation later when the time is right. 

● 05:40: – In either of these options, taxes are still done individually, on the personal level. 

● 06:00: – The plus to a corporation is that it exists in perpetuity and offers limited liability, so if someone sues they are suing the company, and not you as an individual. 

● 07:43: – A business doesn’t have to start thinking about HSD or GSD until they are worth $30,000. 

● 08:40: – As a corporation you are able to take advantage of Canada’s small business tax rates. 

● 12:20: – The simplest way to tell whether it’s the right time to add complexities to your business structure is that you can afford it. 

● 14:10: – It’s better to put together an abbreviated shareholder agreement that’s more like a term sheet than it is to move forward with nothing just because it’s too costly or laborious to establish one. 

● 16:04: – Ted strongly advises against combining your real estate investments with your operating company because it complicates your ability to later sell your business. 

● 19:02: – Ted points out that it’s often more appropriate to have separate legal entities for each of multiple locations of a business or different divisions of a business. 

● 20:42: – Ted suggests a family trust so that the business owner can remain the sole trustee and then make family members beneficiaries of that trust. 

● 24:55: – Another benefit to proper corporate structure planning is tax deferral. 

● 26:22: – The ideal way to set up your corporate structure is to best position it for eventual sale. 

● 26:40: – You have to have a corporate structure in place for 24 months before you qualify for a tax exemption. 

● 30:15: – The same record-keeping and best practices that Ted recommends for the eventual successful sale of a business are also helpful for raising funding to grow your business. 

● 33:16: – You should adjust your team if you outgrow it or it’s no longer a good fit. 


3 Key Points 

1. There are pros and cons to choosing both a sole proprietorship/general partnership or a corporation, as well as to establishing a corporation at the beginning of your business or later in its growth. 

2. It’s crucial to create some form of a shareholder agreement as soon as there is more 

than one shareholder in the business. 

3. Ideally, establish your business structure with the long-term view of its eventual sale. 


Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Anytime you do have more than one shareholder, you should have a shareholder agreement... I sometimes describe it as a prenuptial agreement for business owners.” –Ted Maduri 

● “I think what sometimes people forget about is once you put shares into someone’s hands, they own those shares.” –Ted Maduri 


Resources Mentioned: 

● Website – Jason Pereira’s Website 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn 

● DLA Piper – https://www.dlapiper.com/en/canada/people/m/maduri-ted/ 

● Ted Maduri’s Linkedin – https://ca.linkedin.com/in/tedmaduri 


Full Transcript

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Introducing Financial Planning For Canadian Business Owners14 Jan 202000:00:39

Business owners live complex lives. You have traded the stability of working for someone else, for the uncertainty of controlling our own destiny. Whether you are starting your own business, scaling it, or planning your exit, you face challenges that the average person never has to face. Ensuring that you make the most of your business means not just being the best at what you do, but figuring out all the other complexities that come with it, and that will mean finding people that will help give you the right advice.


The Financial Planning for Business Owners Podcast is here to help guide you regardless of the stage of your business. Each week we interview experts from various fields to help you become aware of what good advice looks like. From setting up your corporate structure to selling your business we tackle both the technical and personal considerations impacting all of your decisions. We can’t make you better at what you do, but we can help you benefit the most from the fruits of your labours.

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Employee Ownership Trusts with Jon Shell | E10807 Jul 202300:36:02

Jason talks to Jon Shell, the managing director and partner at Social Capital Partners. Jon is an advocate for employee ownership trusts in Canada. The episode discusses what employee ownership trusts are, the benefits they provide to employees, and the challenges faced in implementing them in Canada. The conversation highlights the changes in tax laws related to employee ownership trusts and Canada's first attempt at implementing them. 


Episode Highlights

  • 03:16: Jon Shell explains that the objective of the employee ownership trust structure was to provide access to ownership for those who lacked it in the economy.
  • 05:12: In the UK, the concept of an Employee Ownership Trust (EOT) was established in 2014, allowing companies to allocate profit sharing to all employees and sell the company to employees at no cost. Jon highlights the success of EOTs in the UK, with numerous companies adopting this structure. 
  • 06:20: Jon discusses the comparison between employee ownership trusts and employee share ownership plans or stock option plans.
  • 08:11: Employee cooperatives, or co-ops, are another option in Canada. They involve democratic ownership, where all employees have the right to vote on decision-making processes. 
  • 09:37: There is a well-known example of a massive Spanish company called Mondragon, which operates with a structure similar to Athenian democracy. 
  • 10:49 Jon talks about the incentive for the owner who wants to sell their business to an employee ownership plan.
  • 11:11: In the UK, there was a structure that allowed people to use a leveraged buyout on behalf of employees. 
  • 15:23: For the vast majority of businesses, the concern about gaming the system or preventing certain types of businesses from benefiting doesn't hold true. Most businesses do not fall into the category of high-end consulting firms where only the wealthy benefit. 


3 Key Points

  1. Jon shares the success story of the employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) in the US, which has grown to include 6,500 companies and 14 million American workers.
  2. Jon explains how co-ops can be effective forms of employee ownership, but they are typically applied to smaller firms.
  3. The lack of tax incentives beyond deferral is a significant drawback. It creates a situation where there is no real incentive for owners to consider employee ownership beyond personal benevolence.


Tweetable Quotes

  • "Employees get access to shares at a certain price and can exercise them later to participate in the company's growth." - Jon
  • "For larger companies with hierarchical structures, owners may be concerned about the risks associated with selling to a co-op, especially if the company has not operated in that manner before. Co-ops can be effective forms of employee ownership, but they are typically applied to smaller firms." - Jon
  • "Setting up a worker co-op with more traditional governance and committees can be burdensome and costly. In larger companies, it may be challenging for employees to afford the shares necessary to buy the company." – Jon


Resources Mentioned


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Optimal Compensation Saving and Consumption with Braden Warwick | E10718 May 202300:43:42

Jason talks to Braden Warwick, research associate at PWL Capital. Braden has recently composed a study on optimal compensation savings and consumption for business owners of private corporations. Braden has recently composed a study on optimal compensation savings and consumption for business owners of private corporations. Braden's study was a deep dive at a lot of things that started by looking specifically at compensation, structures, and methodologies and had several interesting findings.


Episode Highlights:

  • 01:38: Braden shares how he switched his field and how he joined PWL Capital where he was tasked to answer complex problems that the firm is having. 
  • 07:16: Braden defines the problem while he does all the research, he explains to people everything which is foundational.
  • 08:56: Jason and Braden talk about the different approaches to income as a starting point.
  • 14:43: The final paper investigated over 7,000,000 financial planning outcomes, says Braden.
  • 19:47: Planning should be around keeping the passive income below 150, because that's when the general corporate kicks in and then you are still in that sweet spot of the transition zone for Ontario and New Brunswick residents.
  • 20:49: When the calculation comes up the IP contribution would be less than the equivalent RSP contribution, they can choose to contribute the full RRSP contribution room.
  • 21:31: You can basically transfer your RSP assets into the IP and then if any additional corporate funding is required to purchase that service, then that opens up an additional contribution room from the corporation into the IP.
  • 40:05: If you are primarily an equity investor, you are generating more capital gains, which is more CDA credit, which is tax free. 


3 Key Points:

  1. Braden explains how he is trying to solve the key issues around compensation and retirement savings because dividends versus income are one thing versus notional account-type distributions.
  2. Braden shares how the net personal cash is higher in the transition zone than it is with either the small business rate or the general corporate.
  3. The longer the CDA sits in there, or the longer those tax refunds sit in those notional accounts, the lower the purchasing power becomes over time.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "For me being relatively new to the world of finance was not a trivial task, because especially with things like IP's, you can't just Google that that information is not readily available." - Braden
  • "The problem, as we could starting from the very high level of an individual would come to us with the question of how much can I sustainably spend over the course of my lifetime and then how much net worth will I be left with on average at the end of the day and what's the best plan to get me there and to maximize those." - Braden
  • "For those folks that want to maximize consumption, we found that the IP with the maximum salary was the best route." – Braden
  • "The lower return than the pension also resulted in a lower return within the core, but also less efficient dynamic income." - Jason


Resources Mentioned:


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FHSA with Aaron Hector | E10611 May 202300:29:21

Jason talks to Aaron Hector about Canada's newest registered account, the FHSA - The First Home Savings Account. Aaron Hector is a private wealth advisor for CWB Wealth. He works primarily with individual clients and family direct client relationships.


Episode Highlights:

  • 02:30: Aaron talks about the restrictions in the FHSA account. You can put up to $40,000 in your lifetime. But you can only put $8000 per year.
  • 03:07: Jason explains how housing is a bigger concern in Canada than in US.
  • 03:52: One of the things that always happens when new accounts come out is that invariably people don't understand the rules.
  • 06:40: Aaron talks about the penalty and additional expenses associated with the FHSA account. 
  • 09.26: Before opening the FHSA account it is extremely important to read the small prints, eligibility criteria and guidelines, says Aaron.
  • 11:05: If you start with making fresh contributions to your FHSA, maybe you marry someone who has a house already, that's hour on buying a home for whatever reason that homeownership gold doesn't come to fruition.
  • 12:38: There is a lot more nuance than people are giving credit to the FHSA account, says Aaron.
  • 15:22: You could look at again going into your RRSP and then just deferring that tax, says Aaron.
  • 18:44: You can name a beneficiary successor holder, so successor Holder can only be your spouse or common law. If you pass, then your spouse assumes the count as an FHSA, rather than just liquidating the account and getting the money, but on the beneficiary side, this is interesting.
  • 22:04: As per Jason if he had FHSA, he would use that option to roll it over into a rift.
  • 22:58: If you have to be a first-time home buyer when you open the account the only other time that it makes a difference is when you try and make it tax free.
  • 24:49: If you had money in it's like how you get a double deduction so you get a deduction when you make an RRSP contribution and then the same money you could in theory withdraw through the home buyers plan.


3 Key Points:

  1. To open an FHSA account you need to be a Canadian Resident, not a Canadian Citizen. You have to be at least 18 years old, and you can't be older than 71.
  2. Aaron shares few horror stories of kids in trust for accounts going sideways. He also shares the nuances and concerns of people that one should be aware of.
  3. If you name someone who's not your spouse, as a beneficiary of your FHSA they get the money, but they pay the tax too. The tax leaves the original account holder not dealt with in the final tax return of the deceased. The beneficiary pays the taxes, so it's kind of the opposite tax treatment.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "FHSA works both as an RRSP and a tax-free savings account." - Aaron
  • "FHSA is almost like the HSA in the US. The health savings account and it's tax deductible." - Aaron
  • "The timeline for FHSA is really the same timeline as an RRSP 1871 and you need to be deemed a first-time home buyer." – Aaron
  • "For someone who maybe doesn't have a lot of spare cash, that's a way to use the FHSA program without making kind of brand-new contributions." – Jason
  • "If I do an RFP transfer cause maybe that's what I want to do, then I don't get 40, I don't get an additional deduction." – Aaron
  • "I am not big in putting money in the hands of young adults until they've proven that they can handle it." - Aaron


Resources Mentioned:


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Benefits Benchmarking with Matt Lister | E10504 May 202300:24:30

Jason talks to Matt Lister, CEO of Cloud Advisors. It is a company in the group benefits space, and one of the unique things they have done is they have built a benchmarking system that helps inform business owners as to basically how their plans stack up against competitors in the same space and helps advise around best practices and design. Service is free for employers. Paid by advisors and providers.


Episode Highlights:

  • 01:04: Cloud advisors use the Canvas employee benefits marketplace. Matt explains how they show employers how their benefit plans stack up.
  • 1.20: The number one reason why employers have benefits in the first place is to be competitive and what Matt has done is democratized access to benchmarking data.
  • 02:23: Every advisor got their own limited pool of experience regarding different sectors, different types of companies.
  • 04:58: Employers go through different stages where they don't need benefits perhaps when they very first started, they can't afford benefits and then they quickly start adding people and they get into a world where your benefits become table stakes. So, they become that checkbox.
  • 06:35: Matt explains how their system has options for employers that have no coverage, they can get a sample plan.
  • 07:17: Matt explains how their system intakes the benefits plan and breaks it down into hundreds of different variables that one can then compare by industry, region and group size.
  • 09:57: Matt explains how they developed the bar score, and it stands for benefits, action, retention, and it's like a credit score.
  • 17.14: Matt talks about the type is benchmark that they do. There are basically 2 types, he says.
  • 19:41: Matt talks about the database that they have built and how they segregate problems and solutions.
  • 22:30: Matt says that they recognize that business owners are busy, and they have got businesses to run, and insurance is only a small component of that needs to be done efficiently and effectively and conveniently.


3 Key Points:

  1. Matt talks about the big determinants, basically how benefits programs get structured in terms of, different industries or different careers, different development stages, what are the big factors implemented that should be impacting, and how a plan is designed. 
  2. Cloud Advisor has been in the marketplace coming up eight years and when they first developed the database, they had a very limited amount of data in it to perform the benchmark. Matt shares how they achieved about 15,000 employee benefit plans.
  3. Matt talks about the client output and how they visualize the actual results.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "We show them how their current programs stack up by industry, region group size as well as how they can improve their program." - Matt
  • "When I started in the industry, my dad had spent most of his career working for a public crown corporation with the incredibly robust union." - Matt
  • "We will connect not just with the vendor and the vendors; information will actually perform an instant quote and an instant proposal so that the employer has everything they need to." - Matt


Resources Mentioned:


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Behaviour Finance with Brian Portnoy | E10427 Apr 202300:35:06

Jason Pereira talks to Brian Portnoy, Founder of Shaping Wealth and author of three books, including the must-read advisor book - The Geometry of Wealth. Brian is a well-known expert in the field of behavioral finance, and he will talk about what behavioral finance is and how it affects our decision-making and our relationships with the people advising us.


Episode Highlights:

  • 07:16: We think of ourselves as kind of thoughtful, critical thinkers. But the fact is that the main elements of the brain are designed or evolved to basically regulate all the different biological or physical systems inside of us, says Brian.
  • 09:19: We see good financial planners enter their practices in day-to-day is dealing with people as who they are, as opposed to who in economics textbook said they should be, says Brian.
  • 11.21: Brian says that their brain is a gas guzzler, and it soaks up a ton of energy. It doesn't want to work that hard because we are constantly trying to be efficient, and in the way we use energy, it produces specific outcomes, especially in the context of our decision-making that are quite consequential.
  • 12:34: The brain tends to seek out information that merely aligns to what we were thinking before, says Brian.
  • 14:41: Jason has read in multiple places that the brain, when under stress performs worse and our IQ gets dumber when we are under prolonged stress and our ability to process information just diminishes.
  • 19.50: We need to stop pathologizing normal human behavior and just work with the people who show up in all their messiness and complexity, says Brian.
  • 21:27: Brian explains what they are doing with Shaping Wealth and how they are trying to move beyond that general construct of just understanding dump of information checklists.
  • 24:29: Each of us is born with a certain level of emotional intelligence, just like we have a certain IQ, and emotional intelligence is just not a trait that we're born with, it's a skill.


3 Key Points:

  1. There is a whole stack of evolutionary remnants that are built inside of us that really do not map to the traditional economic man model.
  2. One of the unsung tasks of modern behavioral finance is that advisors get to know themselves as well or better than they are getting to know their clients and stop acting like some diagnostic expert.
  3. Positive psychology is a distinct field of psychology and the science of happiness. It's basically saying what are the inputs to a life well lived.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "Behavioral finance is basically a science and a discipline that sits at the intersection of economics and psychology." - Brian
  • "One of the key assumptions in traditional economics is that more is better, and from an empirical point of view, that's not the way we are wired." – Brian
  • "If someone is coming to you because they think that you can pick investments better than the next guy, I think you have a competitive problem. But if they think that you are better at structuring the estate just perfectly, it's hard to distinguish yourself on those sorts of things." - Brian


Resources Mentioned:


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The Disability Tax Credit with Christine Brunsden | E10320 Apr 202300:30:20

Jason talks to Christine Brunsden, CEO of Benefits2, a web-based application designed to help people and medical practitioners identify disabilities that qualify for the Disability Tax Credit. It also assists them by saving time and money while increasing the rate of success when applying for the Disability Tax Credit.


Episode Highlights

  • 02:56: Through her teenage years, Christine's daughter went downhill, and she ended up going through some really terrible stuff.
  • 03:52: Christine realized how hard it is for young people who are aging out of the system, they don't have the proper support.
  • 09:41: Christine shares an example of a woman who did her disability tax credit with Benefits 2 on January 31st.
  • 11:09: The hard part for everyone involved in tax refund is that nobody has ever taught anything about this in school.
  • 12:02: Christine explains how her platform helps people qualify for disability tax.
  • 12:45: The government tried to bring in the disability tax motors restrictions act and fix the fee at $100. 
  • 17:08: Christine thought the disability tax credit promoters were really predatory in nature, taking that big percentage.
  • 19:10: Christine is a huge advocate for diversity, equity and inclusion, and he is also a huge advocate for people with disabilities.
  • 24:18: The Canada Caregiver credit, medical expenses, and disability supports deductions home buyer's amount.
  • 25:09: 60% of all people who have the disability tax credit are over the age of 55, and the RDSP is not even a benefit for that.
  • 26:22: It's not a disability tax credit. It's really an enabling for people with ordinary everyday impairment to their activities of daily living.


3 Key Points

  1. Christine shares her daughter's ordeal and how her teacher called her out in front of all of her peers at the age of 6.
  2. Christine developed Benefits2 to leave more money in the hands of persons with disabilities and their supporting family members and to ensure Canadians have an option that complies with the disability tax credit promoters restrictions act.
  3. Christine explains how they created a platform, a complex algorithm in the background that once you have answered your questions related to your particular impairment, they write the application for success for you, you get a code and the PDF of the application and e-mail.


Tweetable Quotes

  • "My eyes are really wide open around the disability taxpayer." - Christine Brunsden
  • "If we look at what happens with incontinence, well, somebody who suffers from incontinence is likely going to impair on their physical activity because of the whole leakage issue. They are probably not hydrating properly because of the leakage issue and that they will basically cause some other sort of disabling condition." - Christine Brunsden
  • "Our marketplace will have diversity, equity inclusion, calendars that support all the different awareness dates throughout the country and internationally." - Christine Brunsden


Resources Mentioned


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Find Your Freedom with Jamie Hopkins | E10213 Apr 202300:34:52

Jason talks to Jamie Hopkins, Managing Partner of Wealth Solutions at Carson Group, a national wealth management firm that offers coaching and partnership to financial advisors. Jamie is a well-known personality in the US Financial advisory space and recently published a book called Find Your Freedom Financial Planning and Life Purpose.


Episode Highlights:

  • 05:17: As per Jamie one must take care of basic level of financial planning, cash and flow, budgeting, debt management before one can move on to more complex financial planning, pictures, and strategies.
  • 07:21: Jamie shares his background story and the motivation behind writing the book.
  • 08:06: Jamie explains how they challenge people to write their eulogy.
  • 10:03: If you would change your whole life if that was the case, it probably means you are doing the wrong thing, says Jamie.
  • 10:32: Early childhood development is a lot more impactful than we probably give enough credit for, says Jamie.
  • 11:03: It becomes harder and harder to change people's behavior. We must change the environment or the situational factors around them to then develop actual change, says Jamie.
  • 13:31: In his book Jamie talks about scarcity that changed his view on money.
  • 15:29: Jamie explains how he and his mom encountered different experiences post his father's demise.
  • 16:35: Jamie talks about his childhood trauma and how he learned to handle money.
  • 17:22: Focus on the amount of money, you need to save, there isn't enough money. You can go to the richest person in the world, and they are still trying to save and accumulate more that will never go away.
  • 20:17: When saving money, if the focus is on accumulating, you can't get to an end number. It doesn't top out, but when you can start thinking about the impact you can have, you will find it to be meaningful.
  • 21:04: Community is such an important aspect of our lives in the world and there are great books and research and experts just on the aspects of community.
  • 28:16: Our purpose gets taken away from us, but we don't have to let that happen, says Jamie.
  • 32:09: Goals are mile markers along that way to your aspiration, says Jamie.
  • 32:31: Aspirations can change too; you don't have to be permanent on that.
  • 32:59: If you do not feel freedom in your life today, you don't feel financial freedom.


3 Key Points:

  1. Jamie explains how people's upbringing around money can really impact the way they see the world around money going forward in their adult life.
  2. Jamie shares how important purpose is and how it affects different people and how people can take steps to prevent that gap in their life from existing purpose.
  3. Community is important, but it can also be very negative and draining and it can subtract from your life if you are not purposeful on it.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "If you are living on the street and you just need to figure out where your next meal is, you're not worried about climbing Mount Everest." - Jamie Hopkins
  • "You can just literally Google Carson group and blueprinting guide and you will be able to grab it and download it." - Jamie Hopkins
  • "It's my legacy and when you remove that from somebody, it can take away a lot of their purpose, and if you're not intentional on replacing that purpose." - Jamie Hopkins


Resources Mentioned:


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ROffice with Andrew Evans | E11927 Jun 202400:24:02

In this episode, Jason Pereira discusses the world of virtual assistants for financial advisors, featuring insights from Andrew Evans, Founder of ROffice. Through their conversation, listeners gain valuable knowledge on how virtual assistants can revolutionize the way financial advisors operate, ensuring efficiency and effective client service. This episode is a deep dive into outsourcing certain business operations to optimize service delivery and business growth.


Episode Highlights:

  • 00:37 - Introduction of Andrew Evans and the background to the discussion on virtual assistants. Jason outlines the problem of operational efficiency and how virtual assistants could be the solution for financial advisors, facing staffing issues due to fluctuating workloads or regulatory demands.
  • 01:24 - Andrew Evans discusses the founding principles behind ROffice, emphasizing the common staffing challenges within regulated firms and how virtual assistants can help right-size personnel needs. This segment highlights the innovative approach ROffice takes, likening their service to an "Airbnb" for professional capacity, allowing flexibility for businesses to scale up or down as needed.
  • 04:16 - Andrew explains how advisors can identify the right time to engage a virtual assistant, using an example involving annual client outreach. This moment in the podcast emphasizes the operational pain points that could be alleviated by outsourcing specific tasks.
  • 06:16 - The discussion delves into how businesses often overlook the potential of virtual assistants in optimizing workload management, focusing on the flexibility and cost-effectiveness of such arrangements.
  • 11:01 - Andrew and Jason discuss how ROffice functions as a marketplace to connect advisors with virtual assistants, including how they manage security and compliance concerns. This part of the conversation is crucial for understanding the operational and security framework that encapsulates the virtual assistant offering.


Key Takeaways:

  • Virtual assistants can significantly enhance operational efficiency for financial advisors, allowing them to focus on core activities and client engagement.
  • Identifying tasks that do not require physical presence in the office is the first step toward integrating virtual assistants into your business operations.
  • Working with a service like ROffice offers flexibility and cost-effectiveness, providing a scalable solution to staffing challenges while ensuring compliance and security.
  • The decision to employ a virtual assistant should be preceded by a careful analysis of business needs and potential tasks for outsourcing, ensuring a strategic approach to capacity management.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "Leverage virtual assistants to right-size your personnel needs and focus on what truly matters in your business." - Andrew
  • "Virtual assistants are the middle ground that allows advisors to scale up efficiently without the commitment of full-time hires." - Jason


Resources Mentioned:


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SR&ED with Vipul Jain | E10123 Mar 202300:22:47

Jason Pereira talks to Vipul Jain, an accounting and tax consultant who helps business owners file for shred credits. Vipul explains what SR&ED, or the Scientific Research and Experimental Development program is and who qualifies, and how one can apply.


Episode Highlights:

  • 03:57: Ask yourself these two key questions. The work you are doing, does it have some sort of technological or scientific innovation, and the code of your business? And are you experimenting with new ideas and approaches to solve problems?
  • 05:34: One of the key principles that must be involved in your work is the use of scientific process. The way you work should involve formulation of a hypothesis, testing the hypothesis and arriving at a conclusion.
  • 07:00: Imagine one employee is working on three projects. Two of them are routine quality testing market research, but one in Australia, that portion of the expense can still be claimed.
  • 07:33: Most business owners are to start off having no idea where to turn. This is which Fred Consultancy comes in the picture to help. 
  • 08:53: Vipul explains the process they follow and what documentation is required. 
  • 10:22: The CR that currently is promising a timeline of 90% of schemes will be processed within two months.
  • 11:10: You can get your money in 60 days, and then you can use it for literally whatever you want, like invest in a business, build a jacuzzi if you want.
  • 12:29: If you are smart about it, you think of that money coming in first and you basically float.
  • 13:46: If you are a start-up and if you are going for funding for you. They are basically venture capitalists, so you have to show the work you have done at different stages.
  • 15:41: Vipul explains the audit process of the SR&ED program.
  • 17:16: If you are claiming six month's worth of salaries, show me six month's worth of work.
  • 18:11: We might go a little bit back and forth with the CR, and everything is good. Usually it can pass through, but Vipul has seen teams come down anywhere from 20 to 40%. 
  • 19:53: There are three key questions the CIA asks, which is in the right form that you have to define what technological uncertainty you had.


3 Key Points:

  1. SR&ED, or the Scientific Research and Experimental Development program, is a Canadian tax incentive program developed to encourage businesses of all sizes and in all sectors to conduct research and development in Canada.
  2. Vipul shares what makes you eligible and ineligible for applying to the SR&ED program. 
  3. If you have a scientific process, that's the biggest chunk of you to prove what technical work you did, and how do you prove it?


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "Most government programs are typically focused on benefiting those who are actual resins." - Vipul Jain
  • "Keep in mind when your tax here and you still have 18 months to file the team, and you can file it with your T2 data." - Vipul Jain
  • "If you think you have a budget of 60,000, could technically hire somebody for 100K, get 60% back and your net cost is 40K." - Vipul Jain
  • "I know many organizations where basically they have already factored it in as a line item on their revenue." - Vipul Jain
  • "You can't pay yourself if you own more than 10% of the shares of the company as a contractor." - Vipul Jain


Resources Mentioned:

  • Facebook – Jason Pereira's Facebook
  • LinkedIn – Jason Pereira's LinkedIn
  • https://vipuljain.ca/


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Working with a CoFounder with Tanis Jorge | E10017 Mar 202300:31:15

Jason talks to Tanis Jorge, founder of the CoFounders Hub. It is a resource for helping understand how to come together as CoFounders in order to enable success. For those of you who have been in successful partnerships, it could be great for those of you who have been in unsuccessful partnerships.


Episode Highlights:

  • 01:43: Tanis explains how he built three data-driven tech companies over the course of the 10 years with his best friend Stephen. 
  • 05:07: Tanis shares what people should consider at an early stage before starting any kind of partnership.
  • 06:37: Self-assessment is important, the first one is looking at yourself very deeply. Tanis has a product, and the Co-founders have called the self-assessment, and they walk people through the most in-depth self-analysis. 
  • 11:12: People just seem to think that friendship is important, and, therefore, it will solve the problem.
  • 13:19: Communication and being intentional with the partner is the biggest insurance policy.
  • 14:00: Scaling is a big issue sometimes. As a company grows faster and faster, it gets bigger and bigger.
  • 16:58: If you can put the business as the central figure in your relationship, then emotional decisions have less bite.
  • 18:15: Be clear, having that Depersonalized question doesn't mean that both people are going to agree to that some.
  • 19:25: There are contracts and agreements and clauses that one can put into a partnership agreement, and you do that in the very beginning.
  • 21:17: Tanis' friend Tom Dean's has written a book called Every Family's business, and at the end of it, there are some 12 questions that you should be asking yourself on an annual basis.
  • 25:23: If you encapsulate everything you do what you know, what are the key pieces of advice you are trying to sum it down to when it comes to basically getting involved with the co-founder.
  • 27:40: Tanis shares his views on what's involved when the partnership goes wrong, and someone wants out.


3 Key Points:

  1. Tanis explains how he conducted a detailed survey and launched the book the CoFounders Handbook. 
  2. Tanis advises people to have a very clear picture of what they bring to the table and to really analyze how this will affect the partnership.
  3. Tanis recommends building a trust in your partner where they know without a doubt that the person is getting things done as well, and they don't have to question and go what they do today.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "I get asked to advise on frequently, and what happened was I was approached often by founders who were in partnerships, and they said, look, you've got a track record how is it that you and your partner are still friends?" - Tanis Jorge
  • "People invest a lot of money into their businesses, and you really don't want to just offhandedly jump into something where they will be a key factor in your success." - Tanis Jorge
  • "As much as I love to see successful entrepreneurship, I hate to see things blow up, which can happen too often." - Tanis Jorge


Resources Mentioned:

  • Facebook – Jason Pereira's Facebook
  • LinkedIn – Jason Pereira's LinkedIn
  • cofoundershub.com


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Mastermind Groups with Grant Hicks | E09909 Mar 202300:23:34

Jason Pereira talks to Grant Hicks, a known financial advisor coach who has been out there basically helping advisors build better practices. He is going to share more powerful and more effective means or strategies that he has seen advisors put in place for business owners that have really helped elevate their business practices.


Episode Highlights:

  • 01:07: Grant has been in the industry for 33 years, he now focuses on practice management and all facets of practice management.
  • 01:35: He is going to share a story of one of the advisors he has worked with and their mastermind group, how to build it, and how to manage it.
  • 03:24: We are all business owners, at the end of the day, working on our businesses together. 
  • 04:30: Every business has different issues that they are working with.
  • 07:35: Grant talks about processes and running effective processes and how do you map with the process.
  • 09:53: The HR piece is fascinating, and it's invaluable there because you probably have multiple real time experiments going on, says Grant.
  • 11:04: The more time you give something without a deadline, the less like it is going to get done, you give it a deadline and it gets done.
  • 12:32: Grant explains how he works through the succession and transition issues.
  • 15:11: Grant talks about various priority changes in any business.
  • 15:47: Grant talks about the different success stories.
  • 16:58: Everyone thinks their baby's pretty, especially when it comes time to put a price tag on it and get the entire endowment effect to play there. But reality is, it doesn't matter people are going to judge it for their own what they consider beautiful.
  • 21:02: This is the long game where you are trying to find the ideal clients, and you are trying to find your ideal niche, which would be probably business owners that are selling their practice, and it's the long game where you are getting to help solve the problems.
  • 22:30: Benchmarking is used for financial advisors, but we also use benchmarking for business owners and you could look at how benchmarking is used as a tool to help people guide them as well.


3 Key Points:

  1. Jason and Grant talk about succession and transition
  2. Grant shares what is a very common challenge for most business owners today in the economy.
  3. Grant shares how mastermind group is contributing to bring together a bunch of people who have walked a bunch of different paths. It may or may not be relevant to what you are looking for, but can definitely help.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "We are going to talk a bit about today is the growth aspect of growing your practice." - Grant
  • "I have a weekly poker match with a bunch of buddies from university, and they are at different executive positions, and you listen to the different changes in the work life during COVID, and the entire remote work thing saw a massive productivity spike." - Jason
  • "God knows the statistics on succession are not great. I remember, even in our industry, I have heard statistics in the US say the average successful session takes about seven years to nail down and get completely done, start to finish out the joke that failure Is a lot quicker than that." - Jason
  • "Some people are spending a ton of money on marketing and SEO and different Internet strategies." - Grant


Resources Mentioned:

  • Facebook – Jason Pereira's Facebook
  • LinkedIn – Jason Pereira's LinkedIn
  • advisorproductmanagement.com
  • advisorpracticemanagement.com
  • https://mobile.twitter.com/davideedey


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Experience Economy with Dennis Moseley-Williams | E09802 Mar 202300:34:37

On today's episode, Jason is going to talk to Dennis Moseley-Williams. He is a well-known speaker in the financial advisor circuit who talks specifically about how advisors should transform their business to be based on experiences that deliver true value and enlightenment and transformation to clients. 


Episode Highlights:

  • 1.47: Dennis and his partner Tom and own a small boutique firm and we work predominantly in the financial services industry, helping practices, financial planning practices, create more client value by innovating around customer experience and design and layout. 
  • 03.28: Most people in business confuse service with experience. Service is all about saving customers time and effort. Whereas experience is about creating engagement through surprise, emotion and at times even providing transformational value. 
  • 7.56: Dennis gives an example of his dry cleaner and how he has a flourishing business even though he has a tiny little shop. His customer service is good. He knows every person who goes in. He knows all his customer's name. 
  • 09.53: As per Dennis it is important to know who your client is. Slow time down, don't think efficiency, think memorable. 
  • 14.12: Every one of us that owns the business is living in the age of Amazon and anything anybody wants, including a hammer from the hardware store can be delivered to their house by 8:00 o'clock tomorrow morning. We as consumers are already spoiled rotten. We live in magic times, says Dennis. 
  • 17.19: Consider your client's journey from before they ever come to your business to entering your business to engaging with your business to the end of the engagement, the transaction and finally extending afterward when they are reflecting on their visit. 
  • 18.18: Ask yourself through time of your client journey. What do you do really, really well or well enough? And how could you do it a teeny tiny bit better?
  • 22.02: Dennis shares different customer experiences and how different service provider can improve their processes.
  • 24.38: Efficiency is the enemy of experience. As a business owner we always just do some basic math and calculate time and money. Efficiency is the enemy here because it results into crappy commodified experience.


3 Key Points:

  1. Dennis shares some examples of some delightful engagements that he has seen on things that people wouldn't normally expect.
  2. Dennis talks about the types of loyalty by fear and obligation as well as by connection and identity. 
  3. Dennis shares 3 important questions that you can ask yourself so as to make your client experience better.


Tweetable Quotes: 

  • "The guy that owns the hardware store is trying to pick a totally generic business, believes that the smartest and best thing that they can do is make it easy to get in and get out with a hammer." - Dennis 
  • "There are frameworks, there are frameworks that you can use for experience design."- Dennis.
  • "If you go to Disney land, you should be able to extract the principles of what they have done and apply it to what you have done 100%." – Dennis
  • "It doesn't matter what your business is. I could literally create revenue in it without having to spend any money just by having you change the way you look at time." -Dennis.

 

Resources Mentioned


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Estate Administration with David Edey | E09717 Nov 202200:25:12

In today's episode we have David Edey, CEA and financial advisor in Montreal. He is an author of a book called Executor Help. He is on the show to talk about what it is to be an executor and how an executor can have a successful execution of someone's will in both cases of if you are a business owner and if you are not. 


Episode Highlights:

1.01: David is a certified Executive Advisor. He has been in the financial planning industry for over 35 years in Montreal. He is an author of a book, Executor Help - How to settle on a state - pick an executor and avoid family fights.

2.30: The executor is going to be the individual who's going to make sure that the person who has written will, their wishes that's written in the will is going to be carried out.

4.16: As per David you want to prepare your executors as much as possible, but you also have to have the conversations with them. You have to let them know what your wishes are, and you are going to make sure that you help them with a bunch of professionals around them.

6.10: When there is a death in the family or there is a death, people are traumatized, and you can be fumbling around looking for things when you are traumatized.

08.20: As per Jason, people's perception of what's fair can change over time and he finds that in the end of the life of a parent you never have an equitable split in terms of time supporting that parent amongst the kids.

10.24: People lose their minds and there's a sense of entitlement all of a sudden when it comes to an estate.

12.06: As an executor, you also have to understand that there is legal liability for you to make sure that the estate gets settled, make sure that the taxes are being taken care of, and also to keep yourself from being litigated by the beneficiaries.

13.35: Don't pay any beneficiaries until you've taken care of all of the debts and the taxes, because if it comes back that the estate owes money, try to get that money from the beneficiaries. 

18.15: As a business owner, if you don't think about what is going to happen to the business in case something happens to you suddenly, you are leaving your family in chaos. You are leaving them disorganized.

20.32: As a business owner you need to have some sort of plan in terms of what would happen if something happened to you. You need to create an estate plan. You need to create a succession plan and update it regularly with lawyer and accountant.


3 Key Points:

  1. David talks about the role and responsibilities of the executor and what needs to be done to make sure that this is a success.
  2. David talks about preparation of the estate and how we basically set the stage for success.
  3. It's very important to make sure you are working with an accountant that is professional because they can make sure that the taxes and debts are paid first before you start going out any of the cash.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "99% of the individuals who are left to be an executor have absolutely no idea what to do or where to start." – David
  • "The reason for the book is to get people to make the moves, to have the will and also have the conversations with the executive." - David
  • "You really don't know about somebody until you have to share an inheritance with them." - David 
  • "While the individual is still alive, I would suggest having a conversation with their executor, but also have the conversation with the beneficiaries or family members. And this is probably a touchy point for a lot of people because people don't want to have those uncomfortable conversations." - David


Resources Mentioned:

Facebook – Jason Pereira's Facebook

LinkedIn – Jason Pereira's LinkedIn

https://www.davidedey.com/

https://mobile.twitter.com/davideedey

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Buying A Business with David Barnett | E09610 Nov 202200:34:36

Jason talks to David Barnett; a private transaction advisor. Today he is going to specifically talk about acquisitions, but not from the seller's point of view, but from the buyer's point of view.


Episode Highlights:

  • 2.30: David says that he works with business owners who realize it might be faster and easier to grow through acquisition. Another pool of buyers are people who work someplace and don't like it and typically these people are sort of in the Middle age group where they have got mortgages and families and maybe children and they realize that if they want to pursue their entrepreneurial dream the risks of a startup may just be too great, but if they buy a business, they can become an entrepreneur without the risk of starting up. 
  • 06.04: In the world of acquiring businesses, we often hear about EBITDA earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization. We hear about EBITDA multiples, and in the mid-market space people toss around ideas of what businesses are worth various multiples 4,5,6 times or what have you. In the world of main street businesses, we use a different level of cash flow is called SDE - Sellers Discretionary Earnings and it is the total amount of cash flow available to an owner manager who works full time in the business.
  • 14.36: If you double the size of your business by buying an equally sized company in another city and you double your volume of purchasing, you might not increase sales, you might not increase margins, but you might be able to increase your leverage with suppliers. 
  • 18.46: When there is momentum in the transaction, when the buyer is eager and they want to make a deal, it benefits the seller to be ready to feed that desire with all the information they're looking for so that you can move quickly.
  • 25.02: The reason someone is buying the business, the reason someone is going to be willing to pay some amount of money towards the goodwill that's been built into the business, is because they want to avoid the risk of a startup, says David. 
  • 31.02: When you go to do the due diligence on that business, what you do is you, you check the bank statements to make sure the deposits are all correct and then you go through the box of invoices from all the suppliers, and you add them all up and you compare it to your income statement. If it looks kind of closely then you can be reasonably certain that the financial statements are likely close, but they are never exactly correct.


3 Key Points:

  • David explains the details between EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, And Amortization) and SDE (Sellers Discretionary Earnings).
  • David talks about the factors that prompt a seller to sell their business. 
  • David shares how a buyer has to be ready to be able to deal with the unknowns and a lot of the times those unknowns are managed through the structure of the deal.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "Economics of buying a job is different than the economics of - hey I have got an enterprise already in place I am buying your client list right at you know will be preferred to as a strategic buyer." - Jason
  • "I have also had clients who have mailed out letters in more than two years later, people have picked up the phone and reached back out to them." - David
  • "A properly prepared buyer knows that there are always going to be these unknowns within the diligence." – David


Resources Mentioned:

  • Facebook – Jason Pereira's Facebook
  • LinkedIn – Jason Pereira's LinkedIn

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Old Age Security with Aaron Hector | E09503 Nov 202200:31:01

Jason talks to Aaron Hector, a private wealth advisor for CWB wealth. He is here to talk about old age security.


Episode Highlights:

  • 1.09: Aaron is a financial planner. He works with CWB wealth, and the majority of his time is spent serving private clients and helping them out with their retirement planning and taxes.
  • 1.55: Aaron has been one of the few who spent time writing about old age security topic that is an overlooked benefit compared to the Canada Pension Plan.
  • 2.12: Old age security pension is a government pension. You need to be at least 65 years old to begin to receive it and it's for those who have residency within Canada, either current residency or former residency, you need to have lived in Canada for at least ten years after you are 18 years old, says Aaron. 
  • 5.04: You get an extra .6 of a percent by choosing to postpone your starting point. If you start at age 66 instead of 65, you get an extra 7.2%, says Aaron. 
  • 7.37: For every dollar above your net income exceeds, government will take away 15 cents of your old age security. Technically it is a recovery tax and people refer to this as a clawback, says Aaron. 
  • 10.27: Aaron explains what are some of the ways that a family or couple or an individual can minimize their exposure to all these security paybacks?
  • 12.13: For people who have their own corporations, especially for small businesses who don't have revenue over 500K, they are going to be paying dividends to themselves as a non-eligible dividend, says Aaron. 
  • 17.06: If you have got a lot of health issues prior to making the decisions, then it's kind of hard to make decision for OAS, says Jason. 
  • 18.13: For every year that you live, your life expectancy increases because you are part of the survivor pool.
  • 19.42: Aaron talks about some of his better or favorite tricks or unique planning opportunities that are uncovered when it comes to deferring past 70.
  • 20.26: The whole amount to the lump sum plus the ongoing monthly payments that you begin to receive after OAS is taxed in the year you get the money, says Aaron.
  • 22.36: If you are at 71 and you forgot your OAS all the way through 70 and now you are going to apply retroactively, your one-year reach back is going to be at the age 70, says Aaron. 
  • 28.23: The government did increase the amount payable to people of age 75 and older by roughly $80 roughly per month from October 2022 and this was the first meaningful change to OAS payments amount in very long time.


3 Key Points:

  • Once your net income exceeds a certain threshold government begins to take away your old age security benefit and that threshold for the year 2022 has been set at $81,761 per person, says Aaron.
  • Clawback is something that grinds people because there is a disproportional amount of time relative to the amount of dollars that can be saved spent on planning around all day security.
  • If you think you are going to live to 75, don't postpone OAS, take it at 65 when it's on offer. If you think you're going to live to 90 you are probably wise to postpone it to 70.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "You need to have at least 10 years in Canada to qualify, but 40 to get the regular payment." – Aaron
  • "Effective rates of tax are more important than marginal rates." - Aaron
  • "You also have a one-off strategy around how to structure your estate in some cases, speak about that." - Jason


Resources Mentioned:

  • Facebook – Jason Pereira's Facebook
  • LinkedIn – Jason Pereira's LinkedIn
  • https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaronhector/?originalSubdomain=ca
  • https://www.cwbwealth.com/en

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Canada Pension Plan with Doug Runchey | E09406 Oct 202200:39:25

Jason talks to Doug Runchey, owner & operator of DR Pensions Consulting; he's a foremost authority when it comes to understanding CPP.

 

Episode Highlights:

  • 2.06: Doug started his consulting career 10 years ago on Canada pension and all the age security, but primarily Canada pension.
  • 03.38: You pay for Canada Pension Plan if you have earnings from employment or self-employment. Those are the only two incomes that you can make in CPP contributions.
  • 07.34: Talking about the CPP rates, Dough says that the benefits were going to go up from the 25% earnings replacement formula to a 33.33% earnings replacement formula. And that's what has resulted in the most recent increase basically being staged over five years. From 2019 through 2023 an increase of 1% for each of employer and employer, up from 4.95% to 5.95%.
  • 13.10: If a person is working from the age of 18 to 22-23 in school, barely earning any money, and that is counting against his/her average, that's not great, says Jason.
  • 17.07: If you are going to stop working and you would have drop out. You can end up with a better calculation of your average income by following few simple methods.
  • 18.29: The first step in the process of the calculation is to bring all of your lifetime earnings up to a current year value. In the way that occurs is whatever year your benefits start, you take the average YMPE for the five years ending with the year that your benefits start, says Doug.
  • 20.25: A pension is 50% higher if you wait five years. That is, government backed and guaranteed for life.
  • 22.52: If you have worked five more years until 70, you can take those five years of maximum earnings, replace five years of zero or lower earnings and increase your average lifetime earnings significantly, says Doug.
  • 31.27: The CPP retirement pension, as we say started at 65 or as early as 60 prior to that. If you become disabled while you are working, there is a disability benefit under CPP. 
  • 35.00: If you have got your own corporation and you have the choice to pay yourself a salary or pay yourself dividends, then if you pay yourself. Salary. You are paying the CPP contributions both as the employer and as the employee, so you are paying both halves of it out of the company somehow. But if you pay yourself dividends, you don't pay CPP contributions, then you don't have a pension at the end of it, says Doug.


3 Key Points:

  1. Dough talks about the contribution rates in the Canadian Pension Plan, what are the contribution rates today and where are they scheduled to go?
  2. Doug explains if you want to take your CPP earlier than age 65, there are a couple of things happening. First of all, your calculated CPP, meaning your 25% of your lifetime earnings are calculated at the time you take your benefits.
  3. If you don't take your CPP and you keep working beyond age 65, you can use each year of earnings to replace one of your earlier years of lower earnings, explains Doug.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "The contributions are the only incoming money to the fund except for the reinvestment of those contributions and that's all managed by us." - Doug
  • "Even if you are paying a fairly high tax rate on your CPP because you are still working. And you are the sources of income. Doesn't mean you still don't take it early." - Jason


Resources Mentioned:

LinkedIn – Jason

Facebook – Jason Pereira's Facebook

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Integrating ESG with Daniel Jacob | E09322 Sep 202200:29:41


Jason talks ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance) with Daniel Jacob, Founder of Changing Habits Solutions; a market leading ESG Consultancy that helps businesses incorporate ESG and sustainability strategies into their business model.


Episode Highlights:

  • 0.57: Daniel says that they help companies integrate Environmental Social and Governance metrics into daily corporate operations and develop strategies to improve their ESG performance over time.
  • 3.01: The "E" in ESG stands for Environmental and it takes into account how a company uses natural resources, like water for example, as well as the impacts of its operations on the environment and the communities it operates in.
  • 10.44: Diversity, equity, and inclusion matrix are associated not only with the gender profile of the organization, but by category or by seniority within your organization, says Daniel. 
  • 13.07: Investors are increasingly looking to de-risk their portfolio and businesses developing more ESG practices typically means a better investment opportunity, says Daniel. 
  • 14.58: "For every risk there is an equal opportunity. If you take climate change as a risk perspective and start to assess, how can I reduce my emissions into carbon credit this is a potential revenue generating scheme"
  • 22.01: There are over 1000 different metrics or issues under ESG combined. You want to make sure that you focus on the top ten or twenty on which you can have a material impact, says Daniel. Daniel talks about how you establish and use ESG metrics and how they are different from any other business key performance indicators that they may utilize. 


3 Key Points:

  1. There are over 1000 different metrics or issues under ESG combined. You want to make sure that you focus on the top ten or twenty on which you can have a material impact, says Daniel.
  2. Daniel talks about how you establish and use ESG metrics and how they are different from any other business key performance indicators that they may utilize.
  3. Daniel talks about the actual net reciprocal benefit of ESG. He shares what is the feedback cycle on this underlying business metrics that really matter to business owners which is profitability, costs and revenue?


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "If you are going to do something about sustainability in your own company, your suppliers need to get to the same level as you." – Daniel. 
  • "We have been operating in a way that doesn't consider the environment. Sustainability includes our economy's long term ability to survive" – Daniel.
  • "As investors, we should be empowered with as much information as possible to make decisions for someone who might invest in." - Jason


Resources Mentioned:


Full Transcript

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Successfully Exiting | E09215 Sep 202200:30:21

Jason Pereira talks to Jeff Cullen, Owner & Lead Consultant at Basecamp4; a company that specializes in exit planning.

 

Episode Highlights:

  • 1.05: Exit planning is an emergent specialization in management consulting. It is particularly being driven by the saying that time is running short for a lot of business owners.
  • 1.54: The whole idea behind exit planning is to maximize value and basically get the most successful exit plan or exit from your business as possible, says Jeff. 
  • 3.42: Exit planning institutes have done tons of research on the numbers of companies that don't successfully exit, and it's a pretty shockingly high number.
  • 6.11: You can't manage a 25-to-35-person company the same way that you can manage an 8-person company, and that is one of the first steps where owners may run into problems, says Jeff. 
  • 6.57: Jeff shares how he starts assessing business to understand where the holes are. What does his process look like to understand what's going on with that business?
  • 7.11: The business assessment method that Jeff uses is a lot more holistic. They have three-legged tools which are basically the business, the financial plan for the individual and their family and then there is also the personal side.
  • 10.04: The assessment is done in a way that everything is kind of transparent and there is a logical progression where most owners know how they are performing, says Jeff. 
  • 12.33: When you do exit, it's not a disaster. If any exit happens unexpectedly, the company can survive, says Jeff. 
  • 13.42: Jeff shares in terms of fixing gaps, how much resistance does he sees on an average to acceptance by business owners?
  • 15.29: As the biggest business starts to run better, become more systematized and the owner moves into a more of a strategic leadership position frustration gets reduced, says Jeff.
  • 19.32: If an owner doesn't have a financial planner or if the financial planner, they have is someone they have been using from their 20s and not working as desired Jeff would probably raise the idea of, we want to connect you with somebody who is a bit more sophisticated.
  • 26.06: Jason advises everyone that do not deal with generous lawyers. Deal with specialist lawyers who do or handle the expert cases all the time. 


3 Key Points:

  1. Jeff explains how exit planning is for the most cases is no different than business planning.
  2. Jeff talks about the gap analysis that he conducts and how he explains to business owners what it takes to go from the two to the 4X multiple and how they assess those gaps.
  3. Jeff answers how many people in Canada take well to the fact they are telling their baby is not pretty if baby is business?


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "Everybody exits at some point. You can either do it vertically or horizontally, it's your call." – Jason
  • "Being in control, getting the outcome you want and not having to compromise significantly can be defined as a success." – Jeff
  • "There are any number of times where professionals will outgrow the advisors that they are dealing with, whether it be financial advisor or account boy." – Jason


Resources Mentioned:


Transcript

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What the Seller isn't telling you with Richard Parker | E11814 Mar 202400:39:02

Jason talks to Richard Parker, owner of the Diomo Corporation. They delve into the critical aspects of buying and selling businesses, focusing on the complexities around what sellers might not disclose and how buyers can navigate these challenges for a successful acquisition. The conversation offers a wealth of insights, drawing from Parker's extensive experience in helping individuals acquire businesses in the lower market.


Episode Highlights:

  • 00:07: Jason Pereira introduces the episode, setting the stage for an in-depth discussion on the intricacies of selling and buying businesses, with insights from award-winning financial planner and entrepreneur Jason Pereira and Richard Parker.
  • 02:11: Richard embarks on a discussion about the critical aspects buyers must consider, including the significance of understanding the future of a business from the seller's perspective, the potential for customer concentration issues, and the overarching theme of whether stability or growth presents a more valuable proposition for the buyer.
  • 10:06: Important aspects like key employees and their potential impact on the business after acquisition are discussed. Richard sheds light on the necessity of identifying truly key employees and devising strategies to retain them post-acquisition.
  • 12:22: The dialogue transitions to the operational challenges and pitfalls that might not be disclosed by sellers, emphasizing the importance of aligning the business's needs with the buyer's skill set and avoiding the trap of falling in love with the product rather than focusing on the profit.
  • 15:48: Richard and Jason discuss the negotiation phase, debunking myths about deal-making and stressing the importance of approaching negotiations with a balanced perspective, focused on constructive outcomes rather than winning every point.
  • 18:01: The conversation culminates in a discussion about realistic expectations regarding deal terms, the imperfection of businesses, and the potential for sellers to adjust their expectations based on real market feedback.


Key Points:

  • Understanding the future of the business and uncovering hidden challenges are paramount for buyers.
  • Key employees and supplier relationships significantly influence the stability of the acquired business.
  • Effective negotiation requires a balance between strategic firmness and flexibility, focusing on establishing a mutual understanding rather than winning outright.


Tweetable Quotes

  • "Growth is very sexy, but stability provides value." - Richard Parker
  • "Fall in love with the profit, not the product." - Richard Parker
  • "Deal-making is not about winning every point but achieving a balanced outcome that benefits the buyer while keeping the seller reasonably happy." - Jason Pereira


Resources Mentioned:

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Selling A Business with Jason Watt | E09111 Aug 202200:36:17

Jason Pereira talks to Jason Watt. He recently was part of the sale of his family business. Today they will discuss the tales of what it's like to sell a family business. They will also discuss the ups and downs and unexpected turns that may be included in that. 


Episode Highlights:

  • 1.06: Watt trains financial planners and he was never a financial planner previously. He was in the military till 2006 then he entered the family business.
  • 1.58: Watt says that they had a pretty good transition as far as family businesses go and in 2018, he became CEO of family business. There was no friction back and forth about control from the elder generation to the younger generation or any of that kind of stuff.
  • 4.33: The due diligence process must have alerted Jason Watt to issues and deficiencies that he had and that he needed to get cleaned up prior to any kind of sale, says Jason.
  • 7.15: There was a very short meeting in January 2020 with local company Yardstick and Jason Watt talked price a little bit just to kind of get a feel for whether it would be enough money for them to consider a deal seriously and whether the price would be right for the buyer to make a deal work. 
  • 12.37: The working capital is important to business as any talent they have or any equipment they have acquired because it is also a part of the factory process.
  • 15.36: Jason Watt talks about the negotiation of the deal. What is the methodology of price negotiation, its timeline and how that goes?
  • 18.38: Jason Watt doesn't have a big product liability concern or anything like that and in fact there was a sort of pro buyer reason for the share sale because there are a bunch of regulatory approvals that go along with business.
  • 20.10: Jason Watt shares after the negotiations stage, how long does it take to come to the final contract. 
  • 23.01: It took six and half months from negotiation to final conclusion and Jason Watt thinks that is a reasonable time frame. It should have closed a month earlier than that if they hadn't had that sort of shareholder reorg snag.
  • 31.20: Jason Watt faced some complicated tax issues where his accountant helped him to resolve the issue.  
  • 32.59: The due diligence process is a two way as much as you should be, you know going through and providing a lot of information about your business, you should be learning about the business that's acquiring you, says Jason Watt.


3 Key Points:

  1. If the parents are deeply entrenched within the business operation or the value relative to cash flow is not something that's going to work out over a reasonable amount of time then you do have to consider a third party, says Jason. 
  2. Working capital adjustment, shareholder loans and all similar things were things that Jason Watt wasn't as prepared to deal with because they were pretty good about sort of operational metrics.
  3. Deal with specialist lawyers and people who have been there and understand the process well before.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "When it came time to talk about their retirement meaningfully, we really had to look at a third-party acquirer." – Jason Watt
  • "You wouldn't sign the letter of intent if you are not seriously intending to proceed." - Jason Watt
  • "As long as you are earning income going forward at a reasonable level, you actually get that credit back." - Jason Pereira


Resources Mentioned:

Facebook – Jason Pereira's Facebook

LinkedIn – Jason Pereira's LinkedIn


Full Transcript

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US Bank Accounts with Cato Pastoll | E09007 Jul 202200:13:39

On today’s episode of FPCBO we have brought back Cato Pastoll from Loop. This time he has got a new product that he is basically working with that solves a very simple problem - Opening of bank accounts for Canadian businesses in the US.


Episode Highlights:

  • 1.19: Cato says that early this year, they launched Loop card which is a multi-currency card that allows users to spend in different currencies. Then more recently they launched the loop accounts product which allows users to open accounts in different currencies so a user can do business more seamlessly around the world.
  • 5.48: If you get paid in the US dollars with bank account in Canada, bank will convert the money at that point, and they will often add markup as much as 3% on every dollar that you earn. 
  • 6.33: We do a digital onboarding process like many other Fintech products. We collect information on the company, fill online application forms, and have business names and address. We collect information on any directors of the business as well, explains Cato.
  • 7.12: When you fill some information on the form, and we say you are approved and then once you are approved and once you have the ability to access an account with us you can then go and click on a button and get access to international account details all through platform, says Cato.
  • 7.35: Loop card is a multi-currency card that allows you to spend money in different currencies, and one of those currencies is the US dollar.
  • 8.10: We allow you collect your money in the US dollars that you can keep as US dollar revenue in USD and then you can use your loop cards to go and spend those US dollars for your expenses in USD, says Cato.
  • 9.32: When people encounter the problem, they can go to go to your website, set up an account, get a card and deal with all their American currency build business needs on one end of the border and then bring it back over whatever is left over.
  • 11.38: The four products we have are multicurrency accounts product, multicurrency card product, our payments product and then we also have capital product, says Cato.


3 Key Points:

  1. In the pandemic companies were thinking to go into local bank branch to get them to open a US account but bank told them, we have a branch in the US however, to open up this account, you are going to need to drive to our nearest branch in the US, says Cato.
  2. Cato talks about a multicurrency card. He explains how that works and how it ties into your account. 
  3. We call ourselves kind of a bundle banking platform and the reason we use that terminology is we kind of try to do everything in one place. We try to make all the different products and services that a company needs available to them through Loop, says Cato.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • “Canadian companies do not set up to get their domestic branches to basically be foreign branches of American banks.” – Jason
  • “We allow you to collect through US dollar revenue and if you need to make $50,000 wire payment, we can convert the money to RMB for you and allow you to wire that money to anywhere in the world.” - Cato


Resources Mentioned:


Full Transcript

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Canada/US Cross-Border Planning Revisited with Terry Ritchie | E08930 Jun 202200:43:13

Today we have Terry Ritchie. He is Jason’s go-to guru on all things for American Canadian cross border, and also a friend. Terry is a vice president and partner at Cardinal Point Capital and Cardinal Point Wealth Management, a cross-border or ICPM firm specializing in the cross-border space.


Episode Highlights:

  • 1.41: Terry’s responsibility as one of the private wealth managers is to work with typically private clients and individuals with cross-border issues.
  • 4.29: In Canada, if you die and do not leave things to your spouse, you must pay all reliable due taxes. Whereas in the US, it's not the same.
  • 5.08: In the US, most of the folks who in prior years would have been exposed to the significant estate tax are now off the rules because the tax exemptions have crept up over the years.
  • 13.51: Whenever you are over the $60,000 threshold, that's your barometer in the US to determine whether you are filing a requirement. There may not be a state tax at the end of the day, but there may be a requirement to file, says Terry.
  • 15.37: The closest counterpart to the tax-free savings account in Canada from the US perspective would be a Roth IRA.
  • 16.13: If you do anything like an American in Canada, like setting up a bank account or tax-free saving account, additional compliance requirements must be dealt with on the US side, says Terry.
  • 21.03: Framing taxes as a cost-benefit is a way to get around where the breaking point is or where the client wants to make the call for assets, says Jason.
  • 26.43: If you are an American Canadian and you have got some property, and if there may be some tactics closure on the US side or you remotely cell it, it's good to keep track of any improvements and receipts when you did it.
  • 32.09: We need to think from the IRS and CRA perspective that there is going to be withholding tax requirement that could come into play here when a Canadian ultimately sells their property, and that process can be very, very timely, says Terry.


3 Key Points:

  1. If nothing changes on the gift and state rules and other tax rules that were put into play here, from the end of 2025 to the beginning of 2026, the estate and gift tax exemptions and income tax rates will go back to what they were ten years ago, says Terry.
  2. Terry talks about the fact that Canadian citizens who never have been American could also find themselves on the subject of the US estate tax.
  3. Some people decide to go to Florida, Arizona, or wherever and want to buy a place. Terry explains what should they be concerned about, and what are the best practices to do that?


Tweetable Quotes:

  • “Snowbirds or non-residents in the United States have a non-resident state tax imposed on them if they own certain kinds of defined as a US set of assets.” – Terry
  • “People don’t realize that assets are not just stock. It can also be Canadian-based mutual funds and ETFs that qualify as US assets.” – Jason
  • “Sometimes, it may make sense to hold assets on a joint base and then have transferred death deeds after that.” – Terry


Resources Mentioned


Full Transcript

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Currency Hedging with Shane Slater | E08823 Jun 202200:19:44

Today, we have Shane Slater, Corporate Currency Specialist from FirmaFX. He talks about foreign exchanges, how it impacts business owners and how you can do better than just taking what the bank or your credit card will give you.


Episode Highlights:

  • 1.15: Shane is a corporate currency specialist which means he helps SMEs who get exposed to international business and FX dealings on a regular daily business.
  • 1.44: We are reducing the margins that the big banks are typically known for and providing services or advising when the rates may go in the company's favour and when there is an opportune time to do an exchange, says Shane.
  • 4.09: The exchange which is in labor intensive and there is no material cost is quite excessive. You can get well under 1% depending on your volume and its better ease and convenience type situation, explains Shane.
  • 4.26: The exchange rate is what it is, but if you are losing 3.5% on hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars each way from your profit that should be going to your pocket to reinvest in your business is not good.
  • 5.33: On the minimum about $10,000 per transaction is a point where you are going to start saving 2 to $3 per transaction using a broker from FirmaFX, says Shane.
  • 06.00: Shane talks about the challenge for business owners in international wire transfers and how he helps them with that. 
  • 10.12: The currency hedging is the idea to guarantee you price point for at least some of your exchange so that you have the peace of mind of knowing exactly what you're going to pay or exactly what you're going to receive. 
  • 15.24: Jason explains that you don't have to be able to calculate all the stuff in hedging transactions because in principle the contracts are very straightforward for people.


3 Key Points:

  1. Shane talks about the costs associated to the consumer or the business owner when making a currency exchange.
  2. Hedging is basically a process where you eliminate risks. Shane talks about what can be done to mitigate the risk of fluctuation of currency when you have business in one country, and you are delivering stuff in another country.
  3. Hedging strategies change depending on every single client's position and need like what are your potential waters or what is your actual margins. If you're a tight margin business, Shane recommends hedging a good portion of your FX.


Tweetable Quotes:

  • "We are able to save companies not just money, but time also that they can then put back into their business and doing what they do best and help them grill in a multiple of ways." - Shane
  • "Some businesses consider hedging like gambling, but it's the exact opposite. But the general concept is you are exposing yourself to sometimes millions of dollars throughout years on a FX rate and they are budgeting this FX rate for your currency exchange." - Shane 


Resources Mentioned:


Full Transcript

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