Industry Funds Services chief Gary Weaven has questioned the future importance of the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) in the light of an ever more powerful superannuation industry that invests in unlisted assets.
Talking yesterday at this year's Conference of Major Superannuation Funds Weaven said that the ASX was coming under "severe pressure" in respect to its relative future importance.
He said the advent of compulsory superannuation and the ability for funds to amass large amounts of investable capital off their own back was challenging the very foundations upon which a large and growing stock market was based.
"The ability to add value in less researched markets and the ability to get a premium by foregoing unnecessary liquidity are the flip side arguments to the problem of a lack of capacity of active fund managers to add value in Australian listed equity markets," he said.
The stock market has in the past been an efficient means of providing investors with liquidity as well as a remarkable engine for the aggregation of small investments into serviceable chunks of capital, according to Weaven.
However, the advent of compulsory superannuation is challenging these "presumptions of efficiency," he said.
"Whatever else is said about superannuation it is clearly an awesomely effective means of agglomerating investment capital."
He added that major industry funds were growing in a manner that made short to medium term liquidity irrelevant and that their relative exposure to the ASX would be much lower if it wasn't for supply side constraints on unlisted assets.
Weaven also attacked commission based fees and said a lack of political leadership had resulted in not enough investment in social infrastructure like hospitals, schools and renewable energy.
