Is the Pension Cap choking retirement incomes?


The Government’s Budget changes are continuing to impact retirement income flows, with the latest data released by specialist research house Dexx&r revealing retirement incomes cash flows as declining by 2.3 per cent in the year to December.
The Dexx&r data, looking at total retail and wholesale funds under management and administration (FUM/A), pointed to increased flows across all segments except retirement incomes which the company had been impacted by the Government’s $1.6 million pension cap.
Among the five largest retail and wholesale managers, Macquarie led the way with a 14.9 per cent increase to $113.1 billion, NAB with 12 per cent, the Commonwealth Bank 7.9 per cent, Westpac with 7.1 per cent and AMP with 5.5 per cent.
Looking at the retirement incomes data, the Dexx&r analysis said that during the December quarter net cash flows were negative $4.9 billion which represented a significant increase on the negative $3.5 billion recorded in the September 2017 quarter.
“This net cash outflow highlights the impact of the $1.6 million lifetime cap which took effect in July, 2017,” the analysis said.
Recommended for you
Large wealth management players are increasingly taking an opportunistic approach to their M&A deals rather than a strategic one, while a fear of missing out is driving smaller players to consider selling up.
More than $2 billion in investment activity was recorded for Australian fintech firms last year, according to KPMG, with the GDG/Lonsec acquisition proving to be a notable deal in the second half.
Praemium has stated it is seeking accretive acquisition opportunities in the area of non-custodial solutions where it believes it can further grow its dominant market share.
Iress chief executive Marcus Price has shared how he is seeing “massive tailwinds” in financial advice in Australia, with the firm turning its attention to digital advice following the completion of its transformation project.