It feels like a lot of small but significant changes are happening in the IFA sector this Christmas.
Unbiased will be moving to a subscription-based model from early next year reports Professional Adviser. Unbiased argues that it will see the cost per lead drop for advisers. It will be interesting to hear adviser responses when the new system is up and running and they will be paying in a different way.
We also see two rapid people moves at the end of the year. The first is frankly pretty extraordinary in terms of not being properly announced to the sector.
The PFS interim chair has stepped down after five months in the role. Andrew Briscoe’s departure was confirmed by Money Marketing via Companies House on December 14 .
The PFS said Briscoe left the board on December 1 and was terminated as director of the society on December 7.
Briscoe became interim chair in July, shortly after joining. Prior to this, he was a former chair of the Money Advice Service and Indesser.
The PFS said he stood down to concentrate on “other work and personal commitments”.
Christine Elliott has taken over as interim chair in the meantime.
It is roughly one year since the CII and PFS commenced their current strategy of asserting more CII control over the adviser organisation following disputes with and within the then PFS board. The organisation still appears to be seeking that illusive stability.
Roger Marsden has been appointed as the new chief executive of Succession Wealth taking over from James Stevenson. This, again, feels like a sudden move as Marsden, currently Aviva’s managing director of retail UK savings and retirement starts in January.
In FTAdviser, Linda Gibson, head of regulatory change, EMEA at BNY Mellon Pershing pens a very useful article regarding the polluter pays model and what advisers should do. Some of her suggestions could help advisers keep costs down.
Eleven.2 financial planning founder Greg Moss stirs the Christmas pot a little with some critical comments about some advisers’ attitude to remuneration with a call to end the bravado. All very festive, quite provocative, but I suspect some advisers will agree as well.
Again writing in Money Marketing, Mark Dampier asks why a good investment adviser is hard to find. Perhaps interested advisers should send their credentials to Mark for Christmas. Ho. Ho. Ho.
Doug Clinton of US tech/growth asset manager Deepwater believes that AI and ChatGPT can move the dial on investing as he tells Citywire. AI Santa brings threats and opportunities as no-one said before.
