The recent saga of the Lehman Brothers' MiniBomb reminded me of the GE GreatLink Choice (Aug 2013). In June 2006, a Great Eastern Agent lied and misrepresented to my own father to buy this product as he said it is capital guaranteed by GE. My father was already in his late sixtys and have zero risk tolerance. Fortunately he consulted me and I told him not to invest. So what is the price now? The GreatLink Choice (Aug 2013) latest price at this point of writing is $0.469. The initial launch price was $1. My goodness!!!! My father could have lost 53.1% of his capital!!! Why did I stop hiim from buying? It was due to two reasons: (1) I couldn't understand the benefit illustration. The product summary was hardly written in English. (2) I consulted an ex-GE agent familiar wiith the product. Since I didn't understand about the product summary, I concluded than it must be a toxic waste! To demostrate that I am saying not out of hindsight investing, I did blog about this here: Destructive Financial Adviser Part 6. In that blog it is linked to a posting in SGfunds which I had a short correspondence with my friend to discuss about the risk of this product. Thank goodness my father did not buy this toxic waste!!

As usual, for every incident there is something to learn. The lessons are: (1) Old people are very vunerable to be tricked. If not careful, their entire retirement saving can be suck dry by liars and thieves (2) If a product is too complex, seek advice from someone who knows (3) If cannot find anyone who understands it, forget about the product. It could only be toxic waste.

(It is politically incorrect for me as an IFA to mention company names in this manner. For this posting, I am writing as a consumer whose father was nearly tricked and have his saving suck dry by a thief. If he losses his retirement fund, I'll by default need to supply him with the retirement funding!I want all consumer to be beware of this. Please be careful with your money. I would sue the agent if my father had bought the product. Since he did not buy and there is no finanicial lost, there is no case.)