Second week of triple-digit adviser losses
The financial advice profession has seen the second week of triple-digit adviser losses, with the industry shrinking by 129 to 16,783 advisers, according to Wealth Data.
Like last week, much of the losses were driven by the Australian Securities and Investment Commission’s (ASIC) catching up on licensees that had not been removing advisers that did not pass the adviser exam.
Losses were dominated by the effective closure (down to zero advisers) of 62 small self-licensed Australian Financial Services Licensees (AFSL) for a loss of 74 advisers, with 47 AFSLs having closed last week.
Since the start of the year, 173 licensees had closed while 291 had closed for the current financial year.
Outside the licensees that closed, WT Financial Group was down net of six with all six losses coming from Synchron. Three licensee owners were down net of four including ANZ Bank and Centrepoint.
Growth by licensee was limited to 25 licensee owners with NTAA who own SMSF Advisers Network increasing by four, while three joined the SMSF Advisers Network and one went to its new licensee Advice Assist.
Meanwhile, 8 licensee owners had net growth of two including two new licensees, including Castleguard (Lifespan), while 16 licensees moved up by one including Tal Dai-Chi Life (Affinia) and Fiducian.
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Research by Wealth Data has found exactly half the number of advisers who have worked at closed AFSLs in the current financial year remain on the ASIC FAR.
