Guiding Along The Way…
Meridian designs investment strategies to help clients meet their financial objectives.  Customized for each client and plan participant, this strategy exemplifies Meridian’s intensely personalized service.

The Initial Process
As a trust company, we serve as a Fiduciary which means we are held to a higher level of responsibility than most investment managers.  We take that responsibility very seriously.

We begin this process by defining your investment objectives and constraints. This includes analyzing your personal financial goals, tax situation, investment time horizon, other assets, and risk tolerance.  This is the most important step and is why we emphasize the need for regular one-on-one contact with you.

After we understand your unique situation, we determine an asset allocation designed to improve the likelihood of meeting your goals.  This step involves analyzing different asset classes such as domestic stocks, international stocks, short-term and long-term bonds, and how they tend to interact.

The final step is selecting the specific investments for each asset class.  Depending on your needs and preferences, this may include mutual funds or individual stocks and bonds.  While many investors focus on the specific investments, we agree with most academic studies that show the specific investments are less important than choosing an appropriate asset allocation.

The Ongoing Process
In investing and life the only thing that is certain is change.  Marriage, job changes, children, retirement, and many other events all affect your financial situation.  At Meridian we are with you through each of these changes and will provide objective advice to assure your financial needs are met.

We recommend meeting with you at least once a year to review your investments and personal situation.  You may prefer to meet with us as often as quarterly.  These meetings affirm that our recommended strategies continue to be appropriate for you.

As markets move up and down we will occasionally rebalance your investments back to the asset allocation targets we recommended.  This maintains your investment strategy at the appropriate level of risk.  Your account will be reviewed each quarter by all of Meridian’s investment managers.

Monitoring the individual investments is the final link in the process.  Our mutual fund monitoring is ongoing and comprehensive.  Every mutual fund we use is reviewed at least four times per year for changes in performance, risk, management, and many other criteria.  In addition to our own analysis, we use fund rating services from:

Morningstar
Zephyr
FI 360
Kanon Bloch Carré
Fiduciary Investment Reporting Manager