Financial Adviser Market Insights, October 2, 2025
Adviser Numbers Decreased By 2 For The Week, Moving From 15,442 To 15,440
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After last week's gain of 24 advisers, this week fell by two. A busy week saw 97 advisers joining or leaving. Thirteen new advisers joined, while 15 experienced ones left, resulting in a net loss of two. Two new licensees started, and two stopped.
This week, we also review the updated ASIC Experienced Pathway Data, noting that many licensees and advisers may need to correct the information they have given to ASIC. See details below.
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Key Adviser Movements For This Period
Net change of advisers (-2)
Current number of advisers 15,440
Net Change Calendar 2025 YTD (-32)
Net Change Financial YTD (2025/26) +268
31 Licensee Owners had net gains of 46 advisers
34 Licensee Owners had net losses for (-43) advisers
2 new licensees and (-2) ceased
13 new entrants
Number of advisers active in this period, appointed / resigned: 97.
Growth - Licensee Owners
Three licensee owners had net gains of 4 each:
Insignia Group with three advisers moving across to Shadforths from Conultum, owned by Rhombus and one new entrant joining Bridges
Count Limited with Paragem appointing two advisers one from SGN Financial and the other from Picture Wealth. Count Financial appointed two advisers, one new entrant and one from Hillross owned by Entireti & Akumin Group.
A new licensee commenced with advisers providing superannuation advice and three of the advisers were previously at MUFG Retire360.
Lorica Partners up by three with all advisers still currently attached to Multiforte Group
Four licensee owners up by two
MPFinplan with both advisers moving across from Charter Financial Planning owned by Entireti & Akumin Group
Macquarie Group with both advisers coming back after a break from advice
Lifespan with one new entrant and one adviser moving from Interprac owned by Sequoia
Bluewater Financial Advisors with one new entrant and one adviser moving across from Alpine Financial Advice.
A tail of 23 licensee owners up by net one including Spark Partnership, Boston Reed and the remaining new licensee.
Losses - Licensee Owners
Rhombus down by six, as mentioned above three joined Shadforths and the other three are yet to be appointed elsewhere
Industry Super Holdings down by three, none appointed elsewhere to date
Lifestyle Asset Management down by two and neither have been appointed elsewhere to date
Peter Robert Stem, (You only Get One Life) also down by two with one joining Boston Reed and the other has not been appointed elsewhere
A long tail of 30 Licensee owners down by one each including Infocus, Capstone and PSK Group.
Financial Adviser Register - ASIC Urges Action For All Advisers and Licensees Re Experienced Pathway (EP)
On September 30, 2025, ASIC put out a media release urging all advisers (also known as relevant advisers) to immediately review the accuracy of their information on the Financial Adviser Register (FAR) - ASIC also updated its one-off point in time dataset to September 16, 2025. See below for link to media release.
ASIC initially put out its first media release on this subject on August 8, 2025 and updated the dataset in mid August. We put out a post with our initial analysis on August 21.
The media release this week from ASIC highlights that (as of Sep 16, 2025), some 4,892 advisers will be relying on the Experienced Pathway (EP) post January 1 2026. Included in this number are 912 advisers who have also gained the required qualifications. A further 7,081 advisers have gained the required qualifications. This leaves a total of 3,459 advisers who have not met their qualifications standard, of which some 1,371 may be eligible for the EP.
We have reviewed the dataset from ASIC and ran it past today’s ASIC FAR. The conclusion does not significantly vary from ASIC’s data but there are some interesting irregularities:
Issues picked up with with Advisers who are authorised more than once
There are currently 15,440 advisers on the FAR and 385 are authorised more than once, with one adviser authorised four times. Most advisers affected are authorised at different licensees owned by the same firm. Others are authorised under the same licensee but under different corporate structures (CARs)
The Chart below taken from Dashboard 7B of Licensee Deep Dive - Available To Members - highlight the following issues:
Currently there are 16 advisers who have flagged as Yes to using the EP and also flagged No to using the EP
Another 66 have indicated Yes to EP under one (or more) authorisation, while not indicating anything (blank) under other authorisations
101 have flagged No to the EP under one (or more) authorisation while not indicated anything (blank) under other authorisations.
Number of advisers who have flagged their intention to use the Experienced Pathway. For many advisers authorised more than once, there are some inconsistencies with their responses on the ASIC FAR.
Other potential Issues
Start Date as an Adviser - To qualify for the EP, the adviser must have first commenced as an adviser before December 31, 2011. Currently some 226 have flagged Yes to using the EP, but based on their FAR details they commenced as an adviser after 2011.
Date of passing the Financial Adviser Exam - Previously known as the FASEA Exam, the very latest date to have passed the exam to qualify for the EP is October 2022 (and the adviser must have failed the exam twice before this date). There are 65 advisers who have flagged to use the EP but passed the exam after October 2022.
The data from ASIC and what we have unearthed highlights that there is still a lot to do for many advisers and licensees to get the details correct by Jan 1, 2025. The message from ASIC is very strong ‘Urging Immediate Action From Financial Advisers - Click To View” .
