Fund managers 'should back advisers'
Fund managers can best serve investors by supporting and encouraging the use of third-party advice channels, David Boyle, head of sales and marketing at Mint Asset Management, says.
Tuesday, October 9th 2018, 6:00AM
An increasing number of fund managers are expanding into offering advice alongside their core products.
"We're seeing fund managers are now starting to offer advice directly, which is something Mint won't be doing," he said.
Distribution was key for the industry, he said. It needed to get its message across to everyday New Zealanders who were missing out on returns and short-changing their futures by leaving their money in bank accounts.
"That's probably why some fund mangers are going down the advice route but it can also cause conflict with the third-party channel you have been working with to build your business. You need to be careful how you manage that."
Mint was focused on getting its message out via independent advisers, he said.
"We want to stick to our knitting around investment management, we want to concentrate on that side of the business and how best to meet investor need.
"Mint is a small player when comes to retail value of business. That's why the product is through third-parties. We want to have the confidence that they will be served and looked after as their needs change and as the markets change someone they can refer to and talk to as their circumstances change."
Boyle said advisers needed the sector's full support as they moved through upcoming regulatory change. There was too much fighting within the industry - such as over fees, or active versus passive, but it needed to focus on how it could get New Zealanders' money working better for them.
He said he was a "little worried" about what challenges lay ahead.
"New Zealanders need some level of financial advice and at the moment they aren't getting it, they're finding it difficult to access for a whole lot of different reasons."
The new FSLAB regime would lift the quality of advice but that would come at a price, he said.
Advisers had to work out what New Zealanders were prepared to pay for advice, and consumers had to understand the value of what they are getting. "The challenge for advisers is how to give advice and also charge a fee that's going to be relative to the time they spent on that investor."
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