Australia’s financial advisory and investment platform industry has responded in favour of Perennial Investment Partners’ (Perennial) zero management fee offer.
Perennial’s head of retail funds Brian Thomas said reaction from the group’s clients – particularly the master trusts and advisers – has been positive.
Thomas said clients are glad to see the group are recognising the boost that the Government has given the financial services industry (through its Better Super initiative) and are giving something back.
Count Financial executive chairman Barry Lambert said while the whole industry does benefit from legislated growth, fund mangers have more economies of scale and should be passing some of this back to consumers.
“Advisers don’t have such scale as they have to meet with individual clients and craft individual plans for their clients’ work, so funds managers have to do more on the fee reduction front,” Lambert said.
Rice Warner Actuaries director Michael Rice said research showed there had been a small reduction in overall super fees during a period of increased regulation and higher allocation to (more costly) alternative investments.
“Initiatives, such as Perennial’s, serve to highlight to fund managers that it is a competitive environment, whether they like it or not,” Rice said.
At the end of May, Perennial announced its initiative to reduce management fees to zero for three months in respect of net new investments received before 31 July, 2007.
