Popular blogger and financial advisor Michael Kitces is criticizing the Financial Planning Association for electing TD Ameritrade executive Skip Schweiss as its new president-elect.
Calling the FPA's move a "bombshell announcement," Kitces stated that, among other issues, Schweiss is not a certified financial planner and that TD Ameritrade lobbies against a uniform fiduciary standard — which the FPA supports.
Schweiss "will be the first-ever FPA Chair that doesn't actually hold the CFP mark (even as FPA promotes itself as the principal membership association of CFP professionals)," Kitces wrote in a Thursday blog post titled "FPA Selects Largest Corporate Sponsor As First Ever Vendor Representative To Become National Board President."
The FPA announced Wednesday, the first day of its national conference in Minneapolis, that Schweiss, president of TD Ameritrade Trust Co. who also is managing director of advisor advocacy and industry affairs for TD Ameritrade Institutional, has been named the group's president-elect for 2020. He will become president in 2021.
Schweiss will serve a one-year term beginning Jan. 1, succeeding Martin Seay, who will replace Evelyn Zohlen as president.
A Friday tweet links to his blog, in which Kitces criticized Schweiss' new role by stating: FPA Selects Largest Corporate Sponsor As First Ever Vendor Representative to Become National Board President.