The mission by the financial services giants to dominate the financial planning industry is now complete.
The mission by the financial services giants to dominate the financial planning industry is now complete.
The Money Management Top 100 dealer group survey has revealed that banks, life insurance companies and fund managers now have jurisdiction over three out of every four financial planners belonging to a top 100 dealer. Life insurance and funds management groups control about half of the advisers belonging to Top 100 dealers while banks own about 22 per cent.
Only one of the top 10 dealer groups is privately owned – Barry Lambert’s Count Wealth Accountants. And only one other privately owned group occupies the top 20 – Robbie Bennett’s Professional Investment Services.
The Money Management Top 100 research, conducted by KPI Research, is the first comprehensive survey of the financial planning landscape which has attempted to rank dealer groups by size.
It reveals a number of salient features of the financial planning industry. Pri-marily it shows the extent to which institutions have infiltrated the financial planning ranks, according to KPI Research principal Leo Wassercug.
“I don’t think people realise how much distribution has been bought by the in-stitutions,” he says. “And the word in the market is that the chequebooks are still open.”
On top of the success of big institutions infiltrating planner ranks, the Top 100 survey also reveals the rapidly converging nature of the financial planning market.
It found one planner in five belonging to a Top 100 group is an accountant. It also revealed the high levels of interest from a number of other service profes-sions in the financial planning market. Stockbrokers, actuaries and superannua-tion funds are all installing beachheads while other less likely groups are also eying the market, including lawyers and salary packaging groups.
Top 100 report starts on page 19.
