Banks still have 100s on the Financial Adviser Register
ANZ has been celebrating the de-risking of its business via its total exit from financial planning, but analysis reveals that the major banks, including ANZ, still have a significant presence on the Financial Adviser Register (FAR).
While those listed on the FAR by the banks may be stockbrokers and private client advisers, they are nonetheless on the register and working under bank licenses.
The latest analysis from WealthData reveals that ANZ still has 35 advisers registered on the FAR while the National Australia Bank dominates all the banks with 95 advisers listed under the NAB brand and 174 listed under JB Were.
WealthData’s Colin Williams noted that while the NAB advisers were listed on the FAR, they were not authorised to provide traditional financial advice such as investments via wraps but were mostly authorised to give advice around foreign exchange and derivatives.
The Commonwealth Bank is down to just 25 advisers listed on the FAR, while Westpac is the bank with least exposure with just two advisers.
As the chart below shows, in general terms, the banks have been gradually reducing their presence on the FAR.
The latest analysis from WealthData on adviser numbers suggests that movement has begun to normalise following the rush which accompanied the final financial adviser exam.
Key Adviser Movements This Week:
Net Change of advisers (-5)
20 Licensee Owners had net gains for 35 advisers
22 Licensee Owners had net losses for (-26) advisers
3 new licensees commenced and (-2) ceased
4 Provisional Advisers (PA) commenced and (-2) ceased.
Summary
A quieter week with few highlights. The net loss of five advisers does again indicate that losses have slowed. The number of new Provisional Advisers did slow down after several strong weeks. of gains.
Growth This Week
At the licensee owner level, Industry Super Holdings (ISH) showed growth of 15. However, 14 of the advisers are still authorised at LGSS Super (Local Government Super that re branded to Active Super). We presume that the advisers will eventually be authorised only at ISH.
Count are up plus 2 picking up 1 adviser from AAN Wealth and the other adviser was ex Capstone. A tail thereafter of 18 licensee owners who had net gains of 1 adviser each. Licensee owners included Steinhardt (Infocus) who picked up an adviser from Charter (AMP Group). Centrepoint also up by 1, noting that Centrepoint continue to move advisers from Clearview to Matrix and Clearview now only has 5 advisers.
The 3 new licensees were all single adviser models and details are given to our members.
Losses This Week
WT Financial Group are down (-3) with one of the adviser commencing his own licensee. Evans Dixon down by (-2) as are Insignia. None of the advisers have been appointed elsewhere. A tail of 19 licensee owners down by (-1) each including AMP group, Diverger, Morgans and William Buck.
The 2 licensees that closed both only had the 1 adviser.
Gains Last 12 months
The chart below highlights growth by licensee owners, filtered by most growth over the last year. AIA is out in front but has been losing advisers progressively over the last few months. Count Group are next at 39 and Industry Super Holdings after a big week are up by 32.
Of the top 16 licensee owners (in the image) only 2 have more than 100 advisers and a total of 4 have 50 or more.
As for losses (not shown) NTAA is down by (-391), Insignia down (-271) and AMP Group down by (-248). Of interest, the losses at AMP Group over the last 1, 3 and 6 months have been greater than Insignia.
I would love to know how many actual advisers are able to provide and authorised for holistic advice – Is that number actually under 10,000 when you take out life insurance advisers and all of the derivative and foreign exchange advisers. Break it down even further and how many advisers are authorised to talk about aged care ie have the certification? These figures would be interesting and shed a new light on what we need to do as a profession moving forward. Can anyone assist in collating that? On another note, doesn’t that also confuse why people don’t actually understand what a financial planner does?