> The short version is: retain a competent wealth manager to advise you.

This is not good advice. "Wealth managers" are totally useless and exist just to charge you fees and create complexity. I really like mgummelt's comment above; it doesn't have to be more complicated than that!

The recommendation is typically to use a "fee only" financial planner, who actually charges by the hour for advice instead of taking commissions on the products they sell you.

And how will you verify that they are not taking commissions on the side in addition to your fees?

Depends on your threat model. If you're concerned about the inherent well-known conflict of interest in the industry, it's probably sufficient to ask (a key word is fiduciary - are they a fiduciary or not?). The general pattern for commissioned financial advisors isn't optimal for you as a client, but it isn't fraudulent. There's also an organization called NAPFA [0] that registers fee-only advisors.

If you're worried about a malevolent actor who's willing to commit fraud and openly lie, well, how do you deal with trust for any other kind of professional? Reputation, credentials, reviews, referrals, word-of-mouth, etc.

You can also seek advice from someone independent of handing them your money to invest. You can ask an advisor to tell you what you ought to be doing with a self-directed brokerage account at another firm. I guess it's not impossible that there could be an elaborate scheme to collect commissions even across institutions, but again, you need some sort of trust for the whole project to make any sense.

[0] https://www.napfa.org

Exactly.

Exactly. From personal experience, "wealth managers" are a scam. They're just below the scam scale from mortgage brokers and real estate agents.

You're thinking of people who charge you a management fee and try to "beat the market". I'm talking about people who charge you by the hour to explain to you how to manage your money. Maybe "financial advisor" is a better term?

Either way qualifying any form of professional counsel as "a scam" seems a bit excessive, and also bad avice.

"By their fruits you'll know them". One has to be careful, because there is a lot of professional-looking scam artistry going in this space.

Also, you mention the term "financial advisor". I urge people to remember that there are different kinds of those, including those who know shit and care even less, and all they want is to sign you up to some financial MLM scheme. Source: I know some of the latter kind personally.

Yes, you have to watch out for unprofessional and dishonest people when selecting a service provider. That's very different than saying all providers of financial advice are automatically dishonest by virtue of their profession.