Growth in FAPs and FAs sustained over the last 18 months
Russell Hutchinson runs the ruler over financial adviser numbers and reports there has been some good growth in numbers.
Tuesday, November 18th 2025, 5:03PM
Over the last 18 months there has been sustained growth in the number of FAPs and financial advisers (FAs) based on the register of licensed Financial Advice Providers and Financial Advisers.
As at September 30, 2023 there were 8,696 FAs in 2712 FAPs and Authorised Bodies. At the end of June 2025 those numbers had risen to 9,479 FAs and 2,767 FAP/ABs.
While it’s a somewhat more subjective count, we believe banks and insurers have lost FAs from their FAPs over that period.
We thought we would find that more and more advisers were employed by large advice providers. That was not the case, the distribution of the numbers of advisers in advice providers remains unchanged.
We have seen growth at small, medium, and large FAPs. That applies across the sector as a whole, but may not apply more narrowly to advisers working in the life and health sector – although a quick glance at the numbers of FAs in the top 20 FAPs does not clearly show the trend one way or the other.
It is not possible to tell from the database exactly how much business of different types is done by advisers working within a business that advises on multiple business lines.
We also do yet not see any clear evidence that, say, general insurance is gaining advisers while life and health is not, or that many new entrants are engaged in, say, KiwiSaver or wealth advice rather than life and health. In the absence of clear evidence, for now, we currently assume that the growth in adviser numbers is distributed across segments.
We are also conscious that the register is more likely to capture potential adviser headcount than productive adviser headcount.
New advisers must obtain their qualifications and join an advice provider and go on the register – they may or may not start successfully advising, the register cannot tell us that.
Existing advisers that were, say, recruited last year and are struggling, may cease to produce business and remain on the register for some time – if they remain employed, or notionally in their FAP, while looking for other work.
But the headline growth is there, and, as it costs money to get qualifications, join an FAP, and go on the register, we assume that these numbers do mean something.
They are not success in itself, but they are part of the pre-conditions for success.
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