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21 December 2024
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Unlike family trusts, testamentary trusts are activated posthumously, empowering you to exert post-death control over your assets. Learn how testamentary trusts offer unique benefits and protective measures.
There are well over 800,000 family trusts in Australia, controlling more than $3 trillion of assets. Here's a guide on whether a family trust may have a place in your individual investment strategy.
Single-member SMSFs face challenges where the eventual beneficiaries (or support team in the event of incapacity) will be the member’s adult children. Even worse, what happens if one or more of the children live overseas?
The ways to avoid family disputes in a business is to have good communication, adequate preparation and helpful dispute resolution. Equality without governance and consensus can leave a business exposed.
An SMSF’s governing documents, including the trust deed, should specify trustee structure in the event of the death of a member, to ensure that the deceased’s estate plan is realised.
The merit of appointing an internal or external CEO depends on the company's circumstances. Internal appointments tend to be more successful, although alignment of interests with shareholders is critical.
Only 22% of SMSFs have a corporate trustee, with the rest using individual trustees. The benefits of a corporate trustee are not widely appreciated or adopted, but they will be realised when it's too late.
A compilation of answers to readers’ questions covering powers of attorney, enduring guardianship, succession planning and limited recourse borrowing arrangements (LRBAs) within an SMSF.
It’s with heavy hearts that we announce Firstlinks’ co-founder and former Managing Editor, Graham Hand, has died aged 66. Graham was a legendary figure in the finance industry and here are three tributes to him.
Last year, I wrote an article suggesting returns from ASX stocks would trample those from housing over the next decade. One year later, this is an update on how that forecast is going and what's changed since.
Australia is in the early throes of an intergenerational wealth transfer worth an estimated $3.5 trillion. Here's a case study highlighting some of the challenges with transferring wealth between generations.
The Future Fund's original purpose was to meet the unfunded liabilities of Commonwealth defined benefit schemes. These liabilities have ballooned to an estimated $290 billion and taxpayers continue to be treated like fools.
ASFA provides a key guide for how much you will need to live on in retirement. Unfortunately it has many deficiencies, and the averages don't tell the full story of the growing gender superannuation gap.
The Big Four banks have had an extraordinary run and it’s left income investors with a conundrum: to stick with them even though they now offer relatively low dividend yields and limited growth prospects or to look elsewhere.