James earned his BA with cum laude honors from Utah Valley State College in 2003 and graduated with a Master of Business Administration from Utah State University in 2006. Prior to co-founding RedStone Advisors in 2008 James spent several years with Merrill Lynch. James has a special interest in working with all sizes of organizations in developing and maintaining effective retirement plans and helping their employees understand and utilize their employer’s retirement benefit. This led James to pursue both the Certified Plan Fiduciary Advisor (CPFA®) and Accredited Investment Fiduciary (AIF®) designations. Additionally, James is experienced in working with wealth management clientele and is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ professional and Chartered Retirement Planning Counselor (CRPC®).

James has been featured in Forbes, Fortune and Money magazines, has been named to the Financial Times top Financial Advisors list for 6 consecutive years and was recognized at one of the National Association of Plan Advisors’ (NAPA) top 40 under 40 in 2016 and 2017. He has testified before the Utah State Senate Finance Committee and United States Senate Finance Sub-Committee on topics pertaining to the impacts of legislation on retirement plans, plan sponsors and plan participants.

Established in 2014, this list - officially the NAPA Top Retirement Plan Advisors Under 40, a.k.a. “Aces” - is based on applications received from nominees designated by NAPA Broker-Dealer/RIA Firm Partners. Those applications are then vetted by a blue-ribbon panel of senior advisor industry experts based on a combination of quantitative and qualitative data submitted by the nominees, as well as a broker-check review. These “Aces" are widely seen as the future leaders of the retirement plan advisor industry.

These outstanding individuals were drawn from a pool of nearly 700 nominations.