** About BWA **



BWA Philosophy

BWA Deliverables

BWA
Team

BWA Process

BWA Clients


Max Haspel and the Blue Water Advisors team are committed to the wealth accumulation, preservation and transfer needs of multi-generational clients including corporate executives, small-business owners, investment bankers, professionals, and the already financially independent.

Blue Water Advisors combines boutique service with access to one of the world's premier financial services organization, AXA Financial, Inc through its affiliate AXA Advisors, LLC. Max's unique, values-based approach begins with helping clients define their highest life values and financial goals. Once values and goals are clearly articulated, he helps to build, along with the input of the client and client's other advisors, a comprehensive, written financial and estate strategy. Finally, the strategy can be implemented, monitored, tuned and reviewed on a periodic basis. Members of Blue Water Advisors LLC bring an unbiased, institutional money management approach to the high-net-worth individual.

Max is a third-generation Long Islander and business owner. After graduating from Babylon Village Schools he attended Colgate University and earned a degree in Economics. Max learned the inner workings of Wall Street and securities analysis as an equity research analyst at firms  including Credit Suisse First Boston, Deutsche Banc Alex. Brown, ING Baring Furman Selz and Nations Banc Montgomery.

Max moved his family and business back home to the South Shore of Long Island from New York City in 2001.

 

Blue Water Advisors Philosophy:                                                              TOP

We believe that the best way to help our clients achieve their goals is to:

  1. Discover what is most important to them in life, their values,
  2. Quantify their tangible financial goals,
  3. Analyze their current resources, and finally,
  4. Develop and implement a comprehensive, written financial strategy that maximizes their chances of achieving all goals while minimizing risks.

When advising on clients' investment assets, we believe the most important factor in preserving and growing wealth is asset allocation. Second to allocation, we believe that certain investment managers, who have a demonstrable process and long history of outperformance, may continue to outperform both their peers and relevant benchmarks.

We recognize that taxes and expenses matter. It is our responsibility to recommend solutions that are consistent with clients' risk tolerance and to deliver the best risk adjusted, after tax, after expense, total returns.

 

Blue Water Advisors Deliverables:                                                                  TOP

    • Comprehensive, written financial and estate strategy analyzing current position and demonstrating path to accomplishment of all goals.
    • Ongoing wealth advisory services.
    • Regular (client-specific frequency) update of Financial Road Map®, which focuses on values, goals, and progress benchmarking.
    • Regular (client-specific frequency) update of Implementation Plan, which distills the financial plan into a simple chronological list of action items.
    • Quarterly delivery of progress reports, which summarize assets and the progress made toward expressed goals.
    • Twice-annual discussions of "the big picture," which cover the overall financial situation and review the Implementation Plan.
    • Annual income tax planning (November / December) to minimize taxes and obviate any surprises in April.
    • Bi-decade review of estate plan (once every five years).
    • Ongoing attention to milestones/goals and game plan for the accomplishment of the goals.
    • As-needed assistance with cash and debt management

 

The Blue Water Process:                                                                               TOP

Max Haspel
Blue Water Advisors Proprietary Wealth Management Process

  • Determine appropriate asset allocation based on timeframe to goal, individual risk tolerance and short- and long-term markets outlook (allocation alone accounts for about 90 percent of portfolio return). Utilize efficient-frontier optimization. Draft a written investment policy statement that documents target allocation and allowable variance. We also seek to add incremental returns by taking advantage of "fat pitches" that arise from time to time.*
  • Most often we recommend professional management within each asset class. The most common exception is individual municipal bonds.
  • We always have a first and second favorite manager in each asset class. Our selection criteria include:
    • Risk-adjusted long-term returns and risk-adjusted recent returns vs. appropriate unmanaged index benchmarks and competitive universe of managers.
    • Manager tenure, professional background, education and credentials.
    • Identifiable and attractive management and research processes and philosophies.
    • Long-term focus and conviction (low turnover), thus tax efficiency.
    • Style consistency with some leeway for good managers to add alpha when opportunities present themselves.
    • Appropriate compensation structure and incentives.
    • Personal ownership stake. We like to see a large percentage of the managers' net worth in the fund(s) they manage.
    • Integrity and ethics: We attempt to meet with our managers regularly and look them in the eye. We also attempt to speak with them in non-business settings to determine their ethical and moral makeups.
    • Low expenses in light of value added.
  • We look to add to total returns through tax efficiency. Every recommendation in non-qualified portfolios is made with tax implications in mind. We track accumulated fund gains and losses, annual distribution dates (in case we can dodge an unfavorable event), portfolio turnover and management sensitivity to tax efficiency.
  • Our clients meet with us regularly so we are aware of major life changes that affect how the portfolio should be positioned. We report performance and make any rebalancing, allocation- or manager-change recommendations during reviews. We have tremendous conviction with our manager recommendations and are aware that even the best managers over the long term have quarters and years of underperformance.

*A "fat pitch" is an extreme undervaluation (or overvaluation) relative to alternative asset classes. The most recent example was commodities in 2004. We will not recommend wholesale market timing bets, but rather a temporary overweight (i.e., taking a 10% allocation to 15-20%) position.

 

Blue Water Clientele: (14 openings left)                                                                               TOP

Blue Water Advisors LLC is a boutique financial-services organization whose clients benefit from our unwavering commitment to helping them meet their unique financial goals on time. Our ideal-client roster will be limited to just 50, enabling us to devote 100 percent of our effort to providing individualized service and specialized knowledge to these valued clients. And unlike other firms, our efforts will not be wasted on client acquisition.

The people who we feel benefit from a relationship with us fit the following profile:

  • Have important life goals that will require money and planning to achieve (i.e., financial independence/retirement, children's higher education, charitable giving)
  • Are delegators, who want to have more time for what's really important in life (by allowing us to help them make suitable financial decisions)
  • Are proactive and committed to implementation of appropriate measures to help assure the highest probability of success
  • Value service, advice and professional relationships
  • Are willing to be intellectually honest about their financial futures
  • Have minimum investable assets of $2,000,000 (visible within three years)

Who do you know who you think might fit this profile, and may not have a comprehensive, written, step-by-step financial plan* so that no matter what happens in the market, the economy or the world, they still feel confident that they are on track to achieve their goals? Please feel free to have them call us to schedule a discovery meeting to determine how or if we can assist them.

* Investment advisory services offered through AXA Advisors, LLC