It’s been just over 12 months since the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the biggest bankruptcy in US history that was one of the contributing factors to the Global Financial Crisis.
A year ago, doom and gloom was certainly predicted with many of us in the industry wondering if we were headed into the next Great Depression! But through some of the most tumultuous times many of us have experienced in our careers, the opportunity for innovation has never been greater. Whether it's new advice challenges for financial advisers or product manufacturers creating new products to meet the new environment, this is certainly an era to embrace change.
IOOF, like financial institutions around the globe, was also affected by the Global Financial Crisis. Like many of our competitors, we bore the brunt of ‘frozen assets’ and through dramatically lower global share markets, experienced a reduction in our funds under administration.
As a result of falling share markets and the Australian Government’s ‘deposit guarantee’ we experienced a large flight of money to cash, which we responded to with the introduction of a Term Deposit and the Perennial Guaranteed Cash Fund option across all platforms.
We’re now seeing more cash move back into equity-style investment options. The addition of Direct Shares to the Pursuit platform is perfectly timed to accommodate this shift.
Aside from promoting product innovation, the GFC has also provided IOOF will the ability to grow (through acquiring Australian Skandia Limited and merging with AWM) thus positioning us to be a dominant player in the Australian financial services industry for years to come.
Perhaps even more surprisingly given the poor economic environment, IOOF has also enjoyed positive net inflows into all of their platform products, with a year on year growth in net flows to its flagship platform Pursuit of 21.74%!
This financial year we’ve already launched a raft of new product features including the much anticipated direct share option within our Pursuit Select platform. The simplification of our PDS documents, which were recently awarded ‘PDS of the year’ at the ASFA Communications Awards, is just one of the many product improvements we look forward to continuing to deliver during the year.
If you'd like to talk to one of our Business Development Managers about how we may assist your business, please call Adviser Services on 1800 659 634. If you have any other comments or queries, please also feel free to email me directly.
On behalf of IOOF, I want to reiterate to you how important you, your feedback and support are to our business.
Our team is committed to meeting adviser needs, today and into the future.
We hope you enjoy reading this edition of @dviser Magazine!
Nick Everingham
Viewpoint
Contents
Newsflash: Refunding super contributions – a minefield!
Technical Strategy: In-specie transfer of shares into superannuation – a strategy analysis
Technical Strategy: Small to medium enterprise (SME) clients & superannuation tax planning
Technical Strategy: New income test definitions can impact after-tax income and salary packaging arrangements
Product Spotlight: IOOF Pursuit wins PDS of the year
Product Spotlight: IOOF Multi Manager funds – blended performance
Product Spotlight: New Pursuit Sponsorship
Our People
Performance Data
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