2023 Australian Financial Advice Landscape

As we bid farewell to the Football World Cup, all eyes turn to investments platforms in 2023

With 1,100 adviser already leaving more than 2,500+ reviews as part of the 5th annual 2023 landscape benchmark study, there are some surprising results. It is proving an indicator of where platform flows will go in 2023.

In its fifth year, the landscape provides a snapshot of advisers’ opinions on product, platform and investment. Overlayed with datasets supplied by Morningstar, Beddoes Australia and our own Future Flow Intention data, it provides a rich tapestry of actionable data insights.

Platforms remain the key link in an adviser’s tech stack providing efficiencies that have now become ingrained in adviser workflows. Ones to watch in 2023 not captured in the current results is IRESS’s intention to relaunch the dormant OneVue, and how the Quality of Advice Review will impact platform. Will it strengthen or loosen their stranglehold? Or perhaps as we have seen in the UK, see an army of new adviser providers under the proposed “Good Advice” definition?

So, what are the early signs from this year’s 2,500+ quantitative and qualitative reviews:

• 🔔 Up to 27% of the industry are looking to switch licensees in 2023, with 10% of the adviser market already making active plans to move
• 🔔 AMP and Insignia are most in the firing line when it comes to potential switching away from these licences, continuing previous years trends
• 🔔 83% of the top 100 licensees have had their advisers participate in the study to date
• 🔔 Of those dealer groups with 50 or more advisers, the 5 top participating dealer groups in order so far are Lonsdale, Infocus, Sentry Advice, Advice Revolution and Lifespan
• 🔔 IOOF Pursuit and its investment in its platform continues to show promise, with another year of improved adviser satisfaction
• 🔔 CFS FirstChoice continues to build upon it’s impressive 2022 performance, and there is a clear indicator that flows will follow
  
• 🔔 A slump in adviser support for Macquarie across a range of factors may spell flow trouble in 2023
• 🔔 The challengers of Hub24 and netwealth remain darlings, but there are clear indicators of what advisers are starting to value between the two offerings

The study ends January 2023 and can be found here.

A detailed specific platform report will be produced separately to the 2023 free adviser and licensee report this year to mark the 5th year of longitudinal data and to bring in new datasets that will meld with the primary qualitative analysis.