24 Hr. Commercial Truck Service 928 Winston Churchill Blvd. Oakville From October 1st to December 15th, 2010 On Passenger or Light Truck tires only $70 AND RECEIVE Buy 4 safe MICHELIN tires A better way forward MAIL-IN REBATE $80 Value Haircut, Re-Growth Application, Blow Dry & Make-Up Application $10 off any Spa Services w w w . o a kv ill eb ea ve r.c o m O A KV IL LE B EA V ER Th ur sd ay , N ov em be r 1 1, 2 01 0 1 4 By Dominik Kurek OAKVILLE BEAVER STAFF A long-time Oakville resident who has been in the financial planning business for his entire working career is back to helping peo- ple invest on a regular basis right here in The Oakville Beaver. Financial planner Peter Watsons Dollars & Sense column will once again appear in the pages of the Beavers new business section (page 24 of todays edition). Over 10 years Watson wrote some 400 weekly articles in the paper with his column, which ended in 2003. Now, the column is back and will appear weekly in the Beaver, in the Thursday edi- tions. The intent of the article is to offer investors practical solutions and practical advice to help them meet their objectives, Watson said of his column. Im trying to tell (readers) the good, the bad and the ugly about investments and give them my strong opinion. Sometimes Im quite supportive of what goes on in the industry and sometimes when it comes to fees and things like that, I tend to be a consumer advocate. Watson has been in the investment busi- ness for about 30 years. In 1991 he founded the fee-for-service wealth management firm Peter Watson Investments in Oakville and is with Industrial Alliance Securities Inc. He said the column is for everyone or any- one, who wants to ensure his or her financial objectives. He also added his readers will like- ly have investable assets; otherwise they would not be reading. Watson said having a weekly column will allow him to focus on a topic for several issues at a time, some of which will require re-exam- ining of the issue. Whatever the issue, he said people need a plan. He said investors must have a goal that they can work towards achieving. Fundamentally for people to be successful they need a strategy: a written plan, he said. So all the things that Ill write about will hope- fully encourage people to look at what their objectives are, look at the things that are most important to them in their lives and then figure out a way of achieving them. He said some people will have several objectives, such as those who will retire in five or 10 years and need to plan for that, but also have children who will be heading off to university and they want to help finance that education. You can have multi-layers of objectives and each objective has its own strategy thats incorporated into the grand scheme of things, Watson said. He said his column will be another meas- ure people will be able to use to confirm that what they are doing, investment wise, is the correct thing to do, or it will help readers real- ize new ideas. It will also help people be pro- active with their investments. In regards to being pro-active, he said peo- ple can take control of their investments even though some people say they have no control over the investments. You actually have a fair amount of control on the types of things youre investing in, the time-frame youre investing in, the discipline of investing, he said. You have a fair amount of control over these types of variables and so if the investor is informed, the investor will be, in my opinion, much more successful obtaining their long-term objectives. Peter Watson financial column returns to the Oakville Beaver Peter Watson