Private licensees gain ground as diversified firms approach extinction

The Adviser Ratings Q4 2024 Musical Chairs Report revealed that the number of advisers operating under a privately owned licensee increased more than 6 per cent over the last quarter, encompassing 78 per cent of the 15,477 registered advisers.

Furthermore, privately owned licensees with 100 or more advisers overtook those with 10 or fewer advisers as the cohort with the most advisers, with 4,374 (28.3 per cent) operating under these large licensees, up from 3,541 (22.8 per cent) in the previous quarter.

Even so, small and medium privately owned licensees still grew over Q4, as those with 10 or fewer advisers increased from 27.6 per cent to 28.1 per cent, while those with between 11 and 100 advisers saw a margin increase from 21.3 per cent to 21.6 per cent.

Meanwhile, diversified licensees lost more than half their advisers, dropping from 1,646 (10.6 per cent) in Q3 to just 654 (4.2 per cent) in Q4, and industry super funds or not-for-profits and stockbrokers both lost 0.1 per cent of their advisers.

Similarly, the number of practices operating under a diversified licensee dropped significantly over this quarter from 445 (7.3 per cent) to just 67 (1.1 per cent).

As a result, the number of practices running under a privately owned licensee grew across the board, with large licensees seeing the greatest increase from 2,110 (34.8 per cent) to 2,423 (39.9 per cent), while small and medium licensees now encompass 1,961 and 1,462 practices, respectively.

Despite the shift towards larger licensees, single-adviser practices continue to dominate the industry with 3,684 of the 6,077 total practices falling under this category.

Meanwhile, there are 2,049 practices with between two and five advisers and just 344 practices with six or more.

As such, three diversified licensees were among the top 10 for adviser losses in Q4, including Personal Financial Services, Madison Financial Group and Perpetual Trustee Company, with net losses of 14, 13 and 10, respectively.

Notably, Madison has been in the top 10 for losses in three of the last four quarters, losing net 22 advisers over the last six months.

Looking at the winners for the quarter, the report revealed that First Financial, Charter Financial Planning and Gallagher Benefit Services took the top three stops for adviser growth, sporting net gains of 15, 13 and 12, respectively.