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Your New Year’s resolutions may include personal goals such as losing weight, eating better, exercising more or learning the Mambo. But your resolutions should also include financial goals such as re-assessing your investment portfolio.
With the volatility of the stock market in 2011, some investors ignored their portfolios to avoid the stomach-churning ride of daily price fluctuations. But as the year draws to a close, consider reviewing your investments to determine whether your portfolio could use some improvement.
Jemstep is a website that analyzes a user’s portfolio of mutual funds and ETF’s (Exchange Traded Funds) and suggests the best funds based upon the user’s preferences and investment goals.
I recently spoke with two executives at Jemstep, Kevin Cimring Co-founder and Chief Operating Officer, and Suzanne Pallo, Senior Director of Marketing, about their site which launched in October and is self-described as “Morningstar meets eHarmony.” Cimring pointed out, “There’s a massive void in the market for ordinary investors who need advice as to where to put their money. Jemstep was created to tackle that problem head-on by using technology and creating an online application that’s free and accessible 24/7 to the ordinary investor to optimize their portfolios.”
Jemstep rates mutual funds based upon a Jemscore, which is a 1-100 ranking based on how well a fund meets the user’s profile. Jemstep’s recommendations are non-biased and are based solely upon the perceived fit between a user’s goals and mutual funds and ETF’s, according to Cimring.
An investor can use Jemstep whether his investments are self-directed or whether he is working with a broker, though Jemstep focuses on the long-term investor rather than the day-trader.
“Our investment universe is so daunting today with so many options, consumers don’t know which way to turn. People are left in a state of analysis paralysis,” said Cimring. Pallo suggested that people think of Jemstep as a health check for their portfolios that takes under five minutes to complete.
The service is free of charge. You begin by providing your first name, zip code, and an email account, then setting a password.
Jemstep asks your investment goals:
- retirement
- college savings
- large purchase
- building wealth
You can specify a different goal for each account or a single goal for all of your investment accounts.
Next Jemstep asks what your priorities are for:
- risk tolerance
- management fees
- minimizing taxes
- income generation
- types of mutual funds and ETF’s
Then you link your investment accounts by providing your investment account log-in credentials and Jemstep will analyze your portfolio to see how well your funds match your goals and priorities.
Jemstep uses bank level security and is a read-only system, meaning neither you nor anyone else can access your account through the site. The data is encrypted and Jemstep uses Cash Edge to secure the transfer of users’ data.
After Jemstep accesses your investment account, it then analyzes your mutual fund and ETF holdings and recommends funds that would better fit your investment goals. Jemstep analyzes over 20,000 different funds, ranks them with a Jemscore according to your attributes, then suggests the best funds for your investments.
Jemstep generates graphs comparing the performance of the funds you’re currently holding with the performance of the recommended funds. Jemstep also compares the risks and returns as well as taxes and fees to illustrate the advantages of the recommended funds. Investors who enjoy analyzing data will find plenty of instruments to review the relative performance of the funds.
Jemstep shows you information about the recommended funds, including asset allocation, fund management, and short and long-term performance. Jemstep will also tell you why they suggested the funds as the best fit for you.
Here is a YouTube video illustrating how Jemstep works:
You can try Jemstep to see how the service works without registering. Type in the name of a mutual fund in the search box on the home page, or choose from the most popular funds, and answer three questions about your investment preferences. Jemstep will produce recommendations within the category based upon your preferences.
Jemstep never generates paid recommendations or sponsored listings, according to Cimring. Instead it provides objective recommendations based upon the technology. Pallo said that Jemstep doesn’t generate income now but plans to earn revenue in the future through lead generation from brokers’ advertisements. They are also looking to add higher-level functions which may become available through a subscription.
In the future, Jemstep is planning a feature that determines your asset allocation and suggests investment categories to match your investment goals. “Jemstep wants to be an end-to-end goal-based portfolio management system,” said Cimring.
Jemstep is also looking to launch an iPhone app in 2012.
Do you need to do an end-of-year review of your finances? Are you looking to improve your financial returns in 2012? Does your portfolio need to get in shape? Let us know in the Comments section below!
I don’t like funds they seem to only benefit the people running them. I keep looking for more companies to invest in. Thee appears to be more sellers than buyers at the moment but that can change in the UK very quickly. I’m expecting prices to go up quite quickly once the Eurozone crisis has ended. My family aren’t sure yet whether I am crazy for investing now or very smart; neither do I!
I like the general idea of the app though and I think monitoring you portfolio with your phone is a good idea.
Hi Mike, I know you enjoy investing in individual stocks but there are some advantages to investing in funds, such as a wider diversification of your portfolio. Fees are involved when you invest in funds, but the way I see it, you’re paying for a service. Some people change the oil in their cars themselves. Others think it worthwhile to pay others to perform that service.
When you invest in a fund, you are paying for someone else’s expertise in financial investing. If they can do better than you could, then your selection of the fund was wise. If they don’t deliver sufficient returns, you should move your money elsewhere.
By investing in the Eurozone you are being somewhat of a contrarian, Mike. That may be very wise, time will tell. But others may be a bit more risk-averse.
I truly hope your investments work out well for you, Mike!
Love this! I’m not so great at tracking investments, but my husband is always looking up his investments, and to do so, he has to jump to several different sites. This sounds like a perfect tool for him. And since he now has mastered the iPhone, I am sure he will welcome the 2012 app. Thanks again for bringing a great tech-tool to light.
Hi Carol, I think your husband will enjoy this site. Even if he finds that his investments are well-aligned with his financial goals, the site is very handy for getting a clear picture of the investments you have and how they are performing.
Wow Carolyn, what a great free tool. I will definitely be passing this one along to some friends and family members that may find this extremely helpful with their investment needs as well. Never hurts to have a little more help in this area.
Thanks for sharing this as the year comes to a close. What a great tool to use if we need some help planning for our future or maybe just rearranging some things.
As always, Carolyn’s on top of things for us. Thank you Carolyn and have a great rest of your week. Here is wishing you a fabulous day and a Very Happy New Year!
~Adrienne
Hi Adrienne, Yes this is a tool I’m sure your friends and family will find interesting to use. It provides a very fast analysis of fund holdings and makes suggestions about which funds might be a better fit for their investment goals.
As the year draws to a close, it’s important to take a look at our finances and see how we can do better for next year!
Thank you for your kind words, Adrienne. I’m glad you’re enjoying the blog and I wish you a very happy New Year as well! 🙂
This is very interesting; I will have to plug my account info in so they can help me monitor my gazillion of dollars. Actually my 401k has performed pretty well over the last couple of years but a little more attention to it certainly wouldn’t hurt. I will have to try it out.
Thanks for sharing.
Hi Bill, I think you’ll find Jemstep very interesting. Although it takes a very short time to set up, you can spend quite a while analyzing all of the data it gives you. It’s fascinating to compare all the different aspects of the funds you own versus what Jemstep recommends.
I hope this site proves very fruitful for you, Bill!
Carolyn – This seems to be a very good service to maintain your funds portfolio. I was working for a software company back in India where we had written applications to help Mutual Fund industries. This post made me refresh those memories and how we had to fight for the correctness of the 8th decimal place of their daily NetAssetValue(NAV).
I am not much into investing in stocks or funds in US, but I am sure this is pretty useful information for most of those who are into it.
Thanks for sharing.
Hi Praveen, Wow, that would be quite a job, figuring out NAV to the 8th decimal place.
If you ever decide to invest in US funds, you should check out Jemstep. You will probably be very impressed with the data they provide to users for free!
Carolyn, aloha. What a nifty tool. Thx so much for the introduction. Not only will I be “playing” with it, I look forward to sharing it with others who I know will appreciate it.
Great explanation and video.
By the way, Mad Lips respond to my tweet of that post of yours and we exchanged a number of tweets as a result. Love companies that are “on top of it” like that. One of my tweets was along the lines of “Mad Lips is such a great app, will have to trade in my BB for an iPhone.” They RTed & thanked me. Kudos to them; it was fun.
Hauoli Makahiki Hou. Janet
Hi Janet, yes, this is a very powerful and impressive tool for analyzing your investments. I think you’ll enjoy seeing what is happening with your portfolio and reading their suggestions on how you may be able to improve your returns.
Yes, Michael from Mad Lips is a great guy. I’ve only met him through the app review process but he is a brilliant advocate for his wonderful app.
I’m so glad you got to connect with him. When you get your iPhone you will be able to truly appreciate what a great app Mad Lips is! 🙂
Carolyn, aloha. It is now almost 4 p.m. in PA and the PI does not have this post up yet.
Since they did have Oovoo,I stumbled, G+ and tweeted that one.
Will return later to check that they have posted this.
Aloha. Janet
Hi Janet, Thank you kindly for checking and spreading the word. The article is on the Philadelphia Inquirer website. It just has a very different title. Here is the link: A personal touch for your portfolio.
Carolyn, aloha. Even though the link you gave me did not work, I did a search under your name and found the article. In tweeting it, I noticed that they do not have @philadephiainquirer or something similar so they could track it. Maybe they don’t care about that. In any event, I added @wonderoftech so you could see the tweet and perhaps educate them.
Hi Janet, thank you kindly for spreading the word about my Philadelphia Inquirer article. I just checked the link I left you in the comment and it worked for me. But I truly appreciate you doing the extra work to find the article and let others know about it!
I know, I manually add the @phillydotcom to the tweets from their site. I have made that suggestion and hope they implement it soon!
Hi Carolyn,
I don’t have any investments at all, other than in my own knowledge 🙂
So, this is probably not for me righ now, but it looks awesome, and I’ll be sure to pass it a long to my friends.
Thanks a lot for sharing.
Hi Jens, When you start to rake in the millions for your novel in the coming year, you just may need to make some investments. Let’s hope that’s the case!
Best wishes to you for a joyful and prosperous 2012, Jens! 🙂
You’re right, 2012 is going to be a very interesting year 🙂
Thanks a lot, and best wishes to you as well.
Hi Carolyn, first time I’m here and I love your site, easy to navigate and full of good advice! Yes, such a tool to track one’s own investments is an absolute must – but one should beware of tools that are too automated and can’t take into account the latest events. Because the world of finance, bottom line, is made of people who buy and sell and are swayed in their choices by current events!
So, yes, I would definitely support the use of such a tool provided that whoever uses it realizes that it is simply a convenient window from which to watch one’s investments, but not something that can help decision-making: what I’m talking about is the risk factor, and that can change dramatically from one hour to the next!
Hi Claude, Welcome to The Wonder of Tech! I’m so glad you like the site.
You’re right, Jemstep analysis is based upon past performance of a fund which is no guarantee of future success. People should take Jemstep’s suggestions and then conduct research and make independent decisions.
But it is difficult to sort through all of the funds out there to get an idea of where to begin. Jemstep can be a useful tool to give you a start for investment ideas.
Thanks for stopping by and leaving your insightful comment, Claude! 🙂
Carolyn – Many thanks for taking the time to write about Jemstep. We are excited to be able to offer our service to the public and invite investors to give Jemstep a try for themselves. We are always open to and appreciate feedback!
Claude – You are correct in your observation that typical investor behavior is to react to daily news.
At Jemstep, we believe that the day-to-day fluctuations of the markets and prices is just ‘noise’ that behavioral finance research has shown often leads most individual investors to act in ways that are not in their best interests. Timing the markets is something that even the vast majority of professional money managers cannot do consistently over time. There are too many variables at play to make confident investment decisions for short-term outcomes. Jemstep believes that goal-based asset allocation and smart, personalized investment selection is the key to long-term investment success. Jemstep has focused on fundamental analysis of all mutual funds and ETFs to help guide investors with longer time horizons to better investments that will help them achieve their financial goals such as retirement, kid’s college or wealth building.
Regards,
Kevin Cimring,
COO, Jemstep
Hi Kevin, Welcome to The Wonder of Tech! Thank you for your interview and demonstration of Jemstep. Your service is very helpful for investors to review their portfolios to examine whether their investments align with their financial goals.
Thank you also for responding to Claude’s comment. I wish you much continued success with Jemstep!
it looks interesting
while i don’t invest these days i believe i will do that again in the near future
thanks for the post 🙂
Hi Farouk, Thanks for stpping by. I hope when you do invest that this will be very helpful to you. Happy New Year! 🙂