Lack of financial education in Mexico

Today I saw a product in a Mexican Bank that I think describes pretty well the lack of financial education. The product offers you a pearls necklace and bracelet in exchange of an investment of 9,000 USD in one of their investment funds. A product like that suggests that there is something stinky somewhere. Potential hypothesis are:

1. The pearls are fake
2. The interest given by the fund is quite low
3. Very high commission are charged
4. They are doing the laundry (who is giving out the pearls!)
5. The risk faced by the fund is similar to the subprime mortgage backed securities that Bearn Stearns of Lehman Brothers owned.

They are playing with the fact that people is not rational. Exchanging their future interest and making the best financial decision for a immediate pearls necklace for someone you love. I think that investing in this funds due to the pearls instead of the best return describes something very clearly: "On average, Mexicans do not care about who offers the best financial product, they care about who has the best TV add, the most beautiful models, gives you a necklace or allow you to enter the raffle of a sports car". I found this pathetic. Hopefully there will be more efforts from the government and from the banking industry to educate the population.

It has been said,

Fausto.