Are advisers turning to small licensees?
This week continued to see advisers moving from larger groups to small licensees as another six licensees, which have at least one new adviser, commenced their operations, according to HFS Consulting.
Using the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC’s) Financial Adviser Register (FAR) the firm’s director, Colin Williams, said Midsec Licensing got the largest gain welcoming 11 on board who moved from IOOF’s Lonsdale Financial Group.
Following this, ex-Madison practice Hive Group, which traded as Beaulife, came second in terms of adviser gains as it had six advisers join this week.
Another small licensee Lampert Group, which started earlier in November, saw fast growth as five new advisers joined the firm this week from ClearView Financial Advice while Wealth Trail welcomed the arrival of three new advisers from Financial Services Partners, bringing its total number to 10 advisers.
As far as mid-tier groups were concerned, Lifespan Financial Planning acquired four new advisers who had moved from two licensees operating under the AMP umbrella.
On the other hand, Lonsdale which according to its parent company IOOF would aim to continue to offer advice around retirement planning under a self-employed specialised model, saw a departure of 14 advisers this week which translated into a net loss of close to 50 advisers or 24% of the team since the start of the year.
Also this week, according to HFS’ data, two licensees which jointly accounted for four adviser roles dropped to zero.
“AMP Financial Planning with 288 adviser role losses easily have the most losses followed by NAB and Financial Wisdom that closed,” Williams said.
“While Lifespan are ahead year to date in growth of adviser roles, many are also watching to see if AMP Financial Planning (AMP FP) will hold onto the position of being the largest licensee by the end of the year. SMSF Adviser Network now stand at 842 adviser roles, just 24 adviser roles behind AMP FP.”
By comparison, at the start of the year, AMP FP with 1,156 roles had 230 roles more than SMSF Adviser Network which began the year with 926 advisers all of whom were accountants.
Source: HFS Consulting
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