2 states are overweight in advisers, research shows

New research by Wealth Data has suggested that Victoria and Queensland are overweight when comparing their percentage of advisers against the percentage of residents in each state.

Namely, Victoria had the highest concentration of advisers with 28.43 per cent while it only housed 25.47 per cent of the Australian population. This, according to Wealth Data, meant that there are 1,457 persons per adviser in Victoria.

The only other state overweight in advisers was Queensland, with 20.69 per cent of all advisers but only 20.46 per cent of the country’s population.

NSW was slightly different or underweight in advisers, with 30.27 per cent of advisers versus 31.41 per cent of the population — resulting in 1,688 persons per adviser.

In Tasmania, however, advisers stood at 1.56 per cent compared to a population of 2.21 per cent, yielding a ratio of 2,296 persons per adviser.

In its weekly update, Wealth Data also revealed that the number of advisers had increased by 20 to 15,874 in the week of 15 December.

The count, it said, was propped up by a “good number” of new provisional advisers.

However, Colin Williams, the founder of Wealth Data, explained that “we often see this soon after the financial planning exam results are announced”.

“Otherwise, a relatively quiet week, and one would expect this to continue as we move into the new year,” Mr Williams concluded.