Jouska's Problem: An Indication Of A Conflict Of Interest And Not His Capability In Managing His Stock Portfolio

JAKARTA - In recent days, PT Jouska Finansial Indonesia has become a topic of conversation in the social media world because there are a number of accounts claiming to have been harmed by the financial planner. What's wrong with a financial planning company or financial planner that has hundreds of thousands of followers on social media?

The first time this was disclosed by the @yakobus_alvin account via a thread on Twitter. The thread begins with uploading a screenshot showing the loss from the purchase of shares in PT Sentral Mitra Informatika Tbk (LUCK).

From the screenshot, it shows that he suffered a loss of up to IDR 35.63 million from one of his stock portfolios. From the price of Rp1,965, LUCK shares plunged to the level of Rp394 per share.

He stated that he had 43,500 LUCK shares at the time the price was Rp1,965 per share. Alvin claims to have sold part of his portfolio, so that when the price of LUCK plunges to Rp394 per share, the remaining ownership will be 33,500 shares.

From This To ThisSharing, how is @Jouska_id and Amarta Investa handling their clients. THREAD pic.twitter.com/GFyOzBJuxB

- Alvin Alvin (@yakobus_alvin) July 21, 2020

"I am a client of Jouska in 2018-2019. Above I share my portfolio in shares managed by Jouska. My total assets under management are IDR 65 million," he tweeted, Tuesday, July 21.

In his thread, Alvin explained why he was so interested in using Jouska's services because he saw his Instagram account which was booming and growing and had hundreds of thousands of followers. He felt that Jouska could help him manage his finances and investments appropriately.

Alvin became Jouska's client and agreed on several clauses in the contract. One of the clauses is to allow Jouska to manage Investor's Fund Account and assist in the transaction process.

Alvin is still quite active in providing the latest information on this case. He uploaded several screenshots of several other accounts that suffered a similar fate, namely falling due to Jouska's recommendation to buy LUCK shares which are still as old as corn on the stock exchange floor.

Alvin's stock portfolio that is "stuck" in LUCK is claimed to be the fruit of Jouska's management. Several other accounts also stated that they had asked for the shares to be sold, but this was not allowed by Jouska.

This then raises the question, does Jouska have any affiliation with LUCK? So why did Jouska manage to manage someone's stock portfolio? Isn't this task only an investment manager can do?

We try to trace the real problem with Jouska. There are three things that are the root of the main problem in a number of stories that have occurred in cyberspace recently.

The first is the existence of LUCK shares which have just been listed as a public company on the Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX) as of November 28, 2018.

In its journey, LUCK shares have indeed experienced an unnatural movement since the IPO. Until mid-June 2019, its share price jumped around 546 percent to a level of Rp1,840 per share. Meanwhile, the price at the time of the IPO was IDR 285 per share.

Even LUCK's share price had reached the level of IDR 2,000. However, the shares of the company engaged in the printing industry began to slowly fall.

In less than a month, until August 2019, LUCK's shares fell to Rp1,480 per share.

Having sat in the range of around Rp1,400, LUCK's shares took a dip again in October 2019. From the level of Rp1,475 per share on October 18, 2019, LUCK's shares fell to a price of Rp.492 per share in November 2019.

And towards the end of last year, LUCK's share price continued to fall to the level of Rp380 per share. After strengthening again in February to around IDR 880 per share, LUCK's price continued to fall to around IDR 300 and on Wednesday (22 / o7 / 2020), LUCK's shares were now eroded at the level of IDR316 per share.

The second problem is, not his capacity as a manager of one's stock portfolio. Jouska's professional colleague, Chairman and President of IARFC Indonesia Aidil Akbar Madjid explained that independent financial planners and financial planning firms are not tied to or affiliated with any financial institution or product.

According to his name and professional title, he continued, financial planners are tasked with helping customers plan and educate the public. He emphasized that there is no financial planner authority to manage customer money.

"Financial planners are prohibited and are not in the capacity and position to manage customers' money or carry out transactions in buying and selling customer portfolios, let alone do so with full power, even though they have been authorized by the customer," Aidil said in his official statement, Wednesday, July 22.

In order to be able to manage customer money and buying and selling transactions, he continued, a special license is needed, namely Investment Manager Representatives and Securities Brokerage Representatives working in securities companies. If you have these two licenses, the financial planner can no longer be called independent.

He also explained that independent financial planners are required to notify customers if they have institutional affiliations and financial products. The customer or client has the right to receive information if there is a potential conflict of interest.

According to Aidil, in every plan, financial advisors must place the interests of customers above other interests. This is done in accordance with the risk profile of the customer, financial objectives and timeframe for achievement.

Every customer has a different risk profile, so it is not necessarily that all customers will invest or have to invest in financial products and investment products, let alone investing in shares and IPO shares, "he explained.

Now with regard to the interests mentioned by Aidil, a third problem arises. Quoting CNBC, there is a conflict of interest, where when LUCK conducted an initial public offering, it used Phillip Sekuritas as an underwriter or underwriter, which turned out to be in collaboration with Jouska.

This was revealed by one of the stock market players. According to him, Jouska should provide recommendations for liquid stocks to clients.

"As an investment consultant, Jouska should provide recommendations for 'liquid' stocks, such as in LQ45 or Kompas100. There are also many good small companies, and their financial reports are regularly monitored by analysts in the capital market," said the market player.

According to him, in the capital market it is clear that LUCK is one of the stocks whose fundamentals and liquidity are questionable.

"It is something that cannot be justified if Jouska recommends - let alone executing - client assets to be invested in stocks that are not liquid, have low daily trading volume, and prices do not move according to fundamentals," said the stock market player.

Founder and Chief Executive Office (CEO) of PT Jouska Finansial Indonesia, Aakar Abyasa Fidzuno explained to CNBC why his party is proposing to collect LUCK shares to be the choice of an investment portfolio.

Aakar explained, in providing stock recommendations for investment, Jouska always provides several stocks to choose from.

"Why LUCK? We chose to buy, for example LUCK was in an uptrend or in a strong trend at that time in 2019. Why not recommend stocks that are in an uptrend, then until May (2019) they still pay dividends. And we don't recommend bulging investments. The shares on the IDX are legal to be sold and bought, "said Aakar.