The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has cancelled the Australian financial services licence (AFSL) of a Commonwealth Bank-owned advice group, less than a month after cancelling another bank-held licence.
ASIC cancelled the AFSL of Advice Essentials earlier this month following a request from the CBA, with the advisers operating under the licence moving under the licence of Commonwealth Financial Planning (CommFP).
Advice Essentials was launched in 2009 and initially provided scaled advice to Colonial First State investment clients.
It was later shifted to provide scaled advice services to CBA licensees Financial Wisdom, Commonwealth Financial Planning and BankWest after CBA spilt its Wealth and Investment businesses.
The Advice Essentials planners, who are understood to have been about 20, were already cross-endorsed with the other CBA licensees and were transitioned across to CommFP before the request was placed with ASIC.
In late March ASIC also cancelled the licence of Whittaker Macnaught. CBA stated it had also requested the cancellation after transitioning Whittaker Macnaught planners to the Financial Wisdom licence.
The Whittaker Macnaught brand will continue as it is still in use by a number of planners who came across to CBA after it purchased Whittaker Macnaught.
