Financial Education
Investor education and financial culture are a fundamental tool for investor protection, complementary to other means such as regulation or supervision.
Which are authorized entities?
Only authorized entities can provide financial services. Check the official AFA Register using the link below to see if the entity offering the service is authorized for the service being offered:
How to make investment decisions?
All investment products incorporate a certain level of risk. Therefore, the financial intermediary must correctly explain the characteristics and risks that will be assumed before the acquisition of the product that is being offered or requested.
To find a product that suits your needs, you will need to be informed primarily about your profitability, risk and expenses.
Profitability: It is the remuneration will be obtained for the investment. Profitability depends on several factors: the economic situation, interest rate levels, market circumstances, the issuers financial situation, etc.
Risk: Investing always assumes some type of risk. It should be taken into account that the higher the profitability offered by a product, the higher the level of risk.
Expenses: It is important to know the commissions, fees and other expenses associated with any operation, as they influence their final profitability.
When you adhere to a financial institution to invest in products such as shares, investment funds, fixed income or derivatives, the entity will ask you a series of questions in order to know you better and thus to be able to help you to make your investment decisions and provide the most appropriate services.
The entity must only offer the right products for you, taking into account your knowledge and your experience, to correctly assess the nature and risks of these products.
In addition, when you are provided with personalized advice or your portfolio is managed, the entity will also ask you a series of questions to make sure that the service is in accordance with your knowledge, experience, financial situation and investment objectives.
Entities are required to request all of this information. This obligation is linked, to both the type of service they provide and to the class of product in which the client is interested. The aim is to better understand the customer so they can guide you to through your investment decisions.
Always watch your investments!
The circumstances under which an investment has been made may change over time.
Investor Classification: professionals and retailers
In order to establish adequate protection measures at the level of knowledge that investors have on stock markets, entities must classify their clients as "professionals" or "retail".
Retail customers are those with less knowledge and experience in the stock markets. As a retail customer, you will receive the highest degree of protection.
Conversely, customers with more knowledge and experience are professional clients that will receive less protection as they have more capacity to understand the nature and risks of the markets, financial products and investment services.
Training
Informative session: "Euro banknotes: verifying authenticity and detecting counterfeits"
- Organized by the Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Services of Andorra, The Area of Judicial Police and Criminal Investigation and the Andorran Financial Authority
- Check all the details using the following link
Rates, fees, commissions and charges applied by entities operating within the financial system
The operating entities of the financial system must act transparently and communicate to their clients, in due time and form, the information necessary to enable them to make their decisions with full knowledge of the risks and costs associated with services and products or operations.
In order to comply with this obligation of communication by the entity to clients, making the tariff book available to the public in the offices or on the website of the entities will not be sufficient, but rather informing individually, expressly and in advance all customers, about rates, commissions and charges (hereinafter referred to as rates) effectively applicable."
Likewise, the client must be informed prior to any modification and a minimum period of two months must be granted to modify the contractual relationship, and modifications shall not be applicable during this period. In addition, the client must be informed of his right of separation in the event of disagreeing with modifications proposed and that any costs that may arise from them, should that right be exercised, shall be calculated on the basis of the rates still in force.
In case of being modified downwards, the client will also be informed without prejudice to its immediate application.
Reporting maximum rates will not be considered valid, as rates effectively applicable must be reported to each customer.
For more information, please refer to Technical Communiqué 5/2020-SF "Transparency and information to customers: tariffs, fees and charges actually applicable".