Advisers get slice of Western Pacific

Perth-based dealer firm Western Pacific Financial Group will become almost exclusively owned by its collective of financial advisers after divesting two group holdings to raise $50 million and buy out the firm’s founding shareholders.

The firm has sold its 28 per cent stake in Acumen Capital Securities to the Multiplex property group to add to the 20 per cent holding in the Symetry platform it sold to the Commonwealth Bank of Australia in late 2004.

The sales have been used to buy out group founders Ian Hodgkinson and Rex Bevan, and allow the group to move to a 95 per cent adviser revenue sharing ownership structure, with management owning the remaining five per cent.

Western Pacific has also struck a deal with Asgard to offer a badged version of the St George bank-owned platform — to be called Western Pacific eWrap.

“We were very keen to centralise the holding of the advisers as the previous 65-35 [split between advisers and the founding shareholders] wasn’t aligned, but now that we have a 95-5 split it’s perfectly aligned with what we’re trying to do,” chief executive Geoff Pritchard said.

He said the group, which has 50 advisers, is also considering a range of expansion options.

“The next major initiative in our growth plan will involve leveraging our scale in the risk business and finding a partner who can assist us to achieve our growth objectives in this area,” Pritchard said.

In addition, he said the group would use some of the remaining cash from the sales to provide finance to advisers looking to acquire client bases within their respective geographic locations.