Students are clueless about their loans

Reuters/Andrew Burton

Occupy Wall Street demonstrators participating in a street-theater production wear signs around their neck representing their student debt during a protest against the rising national student debt in Union Square, in New York.

Students don't know much about their college loans (Lendedu)

Student loan marketplace Lendedu says 7 out of 10 students leave college with at least some student debt, and on average with a bill of just less than $30,000. Interestingly, Lendedu found about 92% of students don't know their current interest rate, and 94% don't know their repayment term. Additionally, 76% of respondents were unsure of the difference between federal and private loans.

BP had a terrible 2015 (Business Insider)

The oil giant says 2015 profit plunged 51% versus the previous year to $5.9 billion. The number was even worse for the fourth quarter, crashing 91% to just $196 million while taking a $2.6 billion write-down for its upstream business. In its statement, BP said, "Despite strong operational performance and growing cost reductions, the lower underlying result was predominantly driven by the impact of steeply lower oil and gas prices on BP's Upstream segment, which reported a pretax loss for the quarter." The company said it would cut up to 7,000 jobs by the end of 2017.

1 in 4 don't know their partner's credit score (TransUnion)

A TransUnion survey discovered 1 in 4 people have never known their partner's credit score. TransUnion warns it's important to be honest about your finances as decisions further down the line could be impacted by a poor score. Specifically, your partner's lower credit score could make it more difficult for you to receive a loan, and lead to you receiving a higher interest rate, if applying jointly.

Differentiating yourself from other advisors (Think Advisor)

With all of the advisors out there it's important to differentiate yourself from the pack. Mike Patton, president of Integrity Wealth Management, says while its important to be able to tell your clients what's going on in the markets, it's even more important that your client knows they can trust you. "If you are an honest advisor, and clients realize it, you should do well," Patton wrote. "And that is the differentiator with the greatest value."

The SEC is adding more advisor examiners (Financial Advisor)

A source familiar with the matter told Financial Advisor, the Securities and Exchange Commission is planning to increase the amount of advisor examiners by 20%. The addition of 100 examiners is part of the SEC's initiative to turn focus from broker-dealer operations to registered investment advisor oversight. "Allocating substantial resources to the adviser examination staff is good, sound public policy that contributes substantially to the SEC's mission of ensuring investor protection and market integrity and will meaningfully augment SEC examination of the advisory profession," Investor Adviser Association President and CEO Karen Barr said.