Clients of Storm Financial (Storm) may shy away from seeking further advice from a financial planner after the financial advisory firm entered voluntary administration earlier this week.
“I think a lot of them would be suffering from a lack of confidence in the financial advice market place. They would probably be moving towards people they feel they can trust,” Professional Investment Services (PIS) managing director Grahame Evans said.
“I would think that there would be a lot of people out there who have no where to turn.”
A small number of Storm clients contacted the Queensland offices of PIS after speaking with their accountants, Evans said.
“We haven’t actually been actively looking for Storm clients but because we’ve got a number of accountancy practices up in Northern Queensland, where Storm is prominent, we’ve had a number of clients come back to the accountants asking for help,” he said.
TFS Financial Planning general manager and partner Danny Maher also confirmed that a number of Storm clients had contacted the firm.
“Yes, we’re working with them. My understanding is that Storm is working with ASIC and with the FPA on different fronts and I guess we will all be notified in due course as to the outcomes of those discussions,” Maher said.
A number of AMP Financial Planning practices based in Queensland have been contacted by Storm clients to discuss their options.
Storm has more than 14,000 clients across its 14 Australian offices.
The firm entered voluntary administration on 12 January following an investigation by ASIC in connection with margin loans and related advice to Storm’s clients.
