Many advisors say they're comfortable using emojis like the thumbs-up sign, the fire symbol or a smiley face as a shorthand way to express enthusiasm or lighten a message's tone.
But to industry watchdogs, these now-ubiquitous symbols are a matter for serious discussion.
Exactly how are industry watchdogs and firms supposed to take ambiguous emojis that can show up on occasion in something as weighty as a potential customer complaint?
That was the question a top enforcement official at the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority posed last month during the broker-dealer self-regulator's annual conference in Washington, D.C. Speaking on May 17 at a panel discussion partly on firms' risk monitoring policies. Michael Solomon, the senior vice president of examinations at FINRA, acknowledged the difficulties regulators have had dealing with new forms of communication in recent years.
Of particular concern, he said, are so-called "off-channel" messages sent by text on phones or in encrypted form through services like WhatsApp. Many times by design, these can be difficult to capture and monitor.
And then,
What, Solomon asked, if a customer messages an advisor the words "that recommendation" and then follows them up with "a very angry, upset emoji?"
"What does that mean from a reporting standpoint, or what do you have to do about that?" Solomon said. "These are complex issues, but they're out there."
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A spokesman for the agency said FINRA has no enforcement policy on emojis nor does it plan to adopt one. Solomon, the spokesman said, "was merely encouraging firms to think differently and more broadly about how to supervise texting."
Even so, Solomon's comments prompted Brian Rubin, a partner and securities attorney at the international law firm Eversheds Sutherland, to have a little fun.
Take the "crying face" emoji. According to Rubin, this commonly used image of a round yellow face with tears gushing out of its eyes can be sent "to convey grief." But the same symbol is also employed, Rubin wrote, "to share positivity" and to say "Great performance — thank you so much!"
Similar ambiguity attends the inescapable thumbs-up sign. Older people tend to take it as meaning "good job."
But for the young, "it's now more of an insult than a positive sign," Rubin wrote, citing an
Rubin acknowledged by phone that he was partly having fun with his paper. Still, he said, there is a serious aspect to the questions he's asking.
"Firms are supposed to do risk-based reviews when they're dealing with advisors' electronic communications," Rubin said. "How can they go about doing that now without figuring out, theoretically at least, what the thumbs up means?"
Advisors themselves attest to having a wide variety of policies and practices when it comes to emojis. Johnson Rhett, a financial advisor at Branning Wealth Management in Jackson, Mississippi, said he and his colleagues draw a firm line between communications used for general purposes and recommendations involving investments or other financial matters.
When working on the firm's quarterly newsletters, for instance, he'll throw in an arrow to direct the reader's eyes in a particular direction or a smiley face to lighten the tone. Rhett said he also sees emojis showing up from time to time in emails and other communications from clients. Whether or not he uses them in his replies, he said, he always tries to respond with a professional tone.
It's when it comes to money matters, he said, that emojis become more or less forbidden. Rhett said he and his colleagues make it a point to keep clear of the "rocket ship, money bag and upward-pointing chart" emojis that are often used in online forums to suggest a particular investment prospect is "taking off" or "going to the moon."
"Things like that, people can misconstrue and make them what they want," Rhett said. "And that's what we're trying to avoid. We're trying not to be misconstrued and say anything that could be taken as promissory."
Rhett said his firm relies on a third party, Asset Dedication out of San Francisco, for help meeting its compliance responsibilities. The last thing he wants, he said, is for some regulatory expert to have to try to decipher the meaning of investment recommendations littered with dozens of emojis.
Others are less comfortable using emojis in any context. Gordon Achtermann, a certified financial planner and the founder of Your Best Path Financial Planning in Fairfax, Virginia, said he avoids using the symbols almost entirely in his professional communications.
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"No winking-smiley-face, no laughing-poking-tongue, absolutely never an eggplant or peach," he said in an email. "I might use the basic smiley-face once in a blue moon; it's hard to misinterpret that one."
Natalie Slagle, a financial advisor and founding partner of Fyooz Financial Planning in Portland, Oregon, said her firm uses emojis a lot in emails to clients. But again, they're reserved for informal communications and left out of requests for financial statements or summaries of financial plans.
"So much of our job is to celebrate the great wins in a client's life, whether they're financial or personal," Slagle said. "That's where we get to show more of our human side rather than our business side."
Slagle said her firm conducts all of its client meetings virtually and that emojis offer a good means of conveying emotion at a distance.
"We can't hug them, and we can't give them high fives," she said. "So this is one way we connect on a deep level with clients."
Dale Shafer, a certified financial planner and the founder of Life Moves Wealth Management in Scottsdale, Arizona, said he tries to follow clients' lead. When they're formal, he responds in kind. If they're comfortable using emojis, he's likely to throw one or two into his replies.
"These are some of the little trinkets that can help you build relationships," he said.
Shafer agreed that emojis should be kept out of any recommendations concerning clients' money and investments. He'd hate, he said, to have to answer to a regulator with questions about what a smiley face or thumbs up sent in a text message meant in a certain context.
Shafer also agreed that emojis can be ambiguous. If there's any possibility of confusion in a client's message to him, "I just pick up the phone and give them a call," he said.
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As for regulators, Solomon confirmed at FINRA's conference last month that emojis are not the only form of communication that's causing consternation. He said people who text often employ a sort of shorthand that can slip by the automated compliance programs many firms use to comb through reams of messages to find possible concerning words and phrases or other red flags.
Solomon said regulators need to consider building up a new "lexicon" taking into account some of these novel means of expression.
He also said text-to-voice systems — which can be used to transcribe words while they're being spoken — presents problems. Most automated review systems, he said, are not designed to "ingest" these kinds of messages.
"There's nothing that's generated more hand-wringing in the industry than off-channel communications," Solomon said.
