Planners at the heart of AMP’s AXA play

AMP chief executive Craig Dunn (pictured) has underscored the importance of financial planners in his company’s $14 billion acquisition of the Australian and New Zealand operations of long-term rival AXA Asia Pacific.

Speaking yesterday on the ABC’s Inside Business program, Dunn described AXA’s diverse and multi-branded financial planner network as one of the “key attractions” of the deal, acknowledging that AXA had a “very strong presence, a much greater presence than we have in the [independent financial adviser] market”.

There has been much discussion about how successfully the two companies will be able integrate their different and competing cultures. Dunn pointed to the groups’ comparable histories as mutual associations as one of the reasons for their rivalry, but said there was strong similarities between the groups — in particular their commitment to financial planners — that would act as a bond.

Dunn said both businesses have “a very strong commitment to financial planners and the value of advice to Australian families”.

“I’ve worked in several businesses and the cultures are always different and that’s an important point to recognise,” Dunn said.

“I think though there are more similarities that are more important. I think what defines a culture most is how you interact with the end customer. We both do that through financial planners, and as I said there are more similarities. I think over time people will understand that and they’ll see the benefit of bringing the two businesses together and the success that can bring all stakeholders.”

Dunn said while AMP had allowed for some attrition in adviser numbers as a result of the merger, the group hoped it would retain planners by working with them to “grow their businesses and [allowing them to] be more prosperous and improve their offering to their clients”.

One of the key benefits of the merger, Dunn said, would be the “critical mass that we’ll have in terms of our capacity to invest more significantly in platforms and products and improve services for planners and for customers”.

He confirmed that AMP’s priority in implementing the deal was taking on the major banks in the wealth management space, with the merger giving the two groups significant opportunities to improve the platform offerings of both businesses.

“There is a significant opportunity in the wrap market in platforms that AMP hasn’t taken advantage of in the past,” Dunn said.

“One of the benefits of bringing the two businesses together is the scale they’ll get in distribution and the capacity to substantially improve the platform offering and really take that up to the major banks that are very strong in that part of the market today,” Dunn said.

“We still need to work through and look at the North platform, but based on external reports and what we’ve seen to date, it looks very encouraging.”