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Monday 14th of December 2009
Developments on disclosure requirements for advisers
A bill that simplifies the implementation of the Financial Advisers Act and reduces costs of implementation was introduced into Parliament last week.
The Financial Services Providers (Pre-Implementation Adjustments) Bill makes technical amendments to the Financial Advisers Act (FAA).
The proposed amendments include:
- QFEs will be able to name representatives (contractors and agents) whose advice they will take responsibility for, rather than automatically being responsible.
- QFE employees and named representatives will be able to provide financial advice or conduct investment transactions in relation to products for which the QFE is the promoter under the Securities Act. Currently, the FAA allows this only if the QFE is the issuer of the product.
- The ability to provide financial advice or conduct investment transactions in relation to a QFE's Category One products (without being an authorised financial adviser) will be extended to the QFE's named representatives. This is currently only permitted in respect of the QFE's employees.
- Term life insurance policies, call debt securities, call building society shares and bonus bonds are now prescribed as Category Two products.
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FMA wants clearer fees
The Report (p.14) contains the following recommendation for FAPs: "Disclose commissions as a dollar figure. While commissions can be disclosed as either a percentage or dollar figure, we consider disclosure in dollar terms to be good practice to assist with investors readily understanding what the adviser will get out of the advice process."
Disclosing commission in dollar figures was one of the 3 options floated in the April 2018 Disclosure Requirements discussion paper from MBIE.
This option was ultimately rejected in favour of a principles-based approach.
The examples of commission disclosure in the resulting Regulations ("Connor and Ari") are expressed in percentage terms.
While the FMA may hold the view that disclosure in dollar terms is "good practice", this is not where the regulations landed at the conclusion of the 2018 consultation process.
23 hours ago Paul Flood
Advisers embrace Westpac after trail commissions removed
@The Laird - No, not really. The headline of this article could equally have been: "Advisers embrace Westpac after upfront commissions increased to highest across the main banks."
1 day ago Paul Flood
Advisers embrace Westpac after trail commissions removed
Doesn't this result call into question the criticism from certain quarters that Mortgage Advisers are driven predominantly by commission considerations?
1 day ago The Laird
FMA wants clearer fees
@first time caller - I can see the complexity you highlight, but as above, investors should be able to see what they are paying without having to reference multiple documents. Investment admin can track and report deductions for tax, withdrawals, fees et al, would be /should be straightforward to aggregate advice fees into costs at member level... at least I hope so.
2 days ago Goldcard
FMA wants clearer fees
@goldcard - how would you propose that a fund manager calculates the TER to include adviser fees given not all clients pay them and different advisers charge different fees, not to mention some advisors charge different fees to different clients? The advice fee gets disclosed in the adviser's disclosure statement and the statement of advice, so the client can add that to the published TER of the fund they are invested in to see how much they are paying overall.
3 days ago First time caller