New financial year adviser gains continue

The financial advice profession has enjoyed a net growth of over 130 advisers since the new financial year began.

According to Wealth Data, there has been a net increase of 134 advisers for the 2024–25 financial year to date (FYTD). This is exactly the same volume as last year, which had 134 advisers as of 20 July 2023.

This is positive news given previous concerns about how growth will be slower this year as over 100 were lost during June.

However, Wealth Data founder Colin Williams has flagged that it is “still early days” and that while financial YTD numbers may be in line, calendar YTD numbers are lower than last year. At this time in 2023, there had been net losses of 90 advisers, whereas this calendar year has seen losses of 138.

The beginning of the financial year period often sees a higher number of advisers join the Financial Advisers Register as many look to switch licensees, he previously said.

The past month’s data, compared with the same period last year, also paints a less optimistic picture as between 13 June and 18 July 2024, there was a net loss of 113 over the period, compared with a loss of 88 during the same time frame in 2023.

In this past week to 18 July 2024, there was a net gain of 11 advisers following gains of 39 in the previous week, which brings the total to 50. This marks a positive departure from six consecutive weeks of losses prior.

Williams said he was hopeful the positive gains seen over the last two weeks would continue.

“It would be nice to see some solid positive weeks over the coming months. We know we tend to have a lot of resignations at the end of the calendar year and it would be nice to have a buffer before then,” he said.

Weekly movements

This week’s rise of 11 advisers was driven by 18 new entrants who joined the profession. Six new licensees opened their doors and one ceased, while 90 advisers were active with appointments and resignations.

Assessing the adviser gains of the week, 33 licensee owners had a net growth of 49 advisers in total.

A new licensee started with five advisers, with four of them moving from Grimsey Wealth and one new entrant joining.

Five licensee owners grew by net three advisers each, including Count and AMP Group, while two new licensees commenced with two advisers each.

A tail of 21 licensees gained net one adviser each, such as Morgans, Findex and WT Financial Group.

In terms of losses, 25 Australian Financial Services (AFS) licensees had net declines of 36 advisers in total. Grimsey Wealth bid farewell to the four advisers that switched to the new licensee.

Three licensee owners were down by three advisers each, including Ord Minnett Group and Core Financial Services. Both NSW Complete and PSK lost two advisers each, while 19 licensee owners lost one adviser each. These AFSLs included Sequoia Group, Industry Super Holdings, and Bell Financial.

Last week, Centrepoint Alliance was crowned as the licensee with the highest growth over FY2023–24 with a net gain of 41 advisers, while Count saw the greatest loss at 102 advisers over the 12-month period. Wealth Data also recently provided an updated ranking of the top three licensees.