Planner sentiment picks up

The early months of the year may have represented the lowest ebb for Australian financial planners, with new Wealth Insights research revealing a distinct improvement in sentiment.

The Wealth Insights adviser sentiment research for April and May has revealed that many of the planners who were feeling deeply negative in February have become decidedly more optimistic on the back of two months of improving market returns.

The Wealth Insights data reveals that while in February 48 per cent of planners regarded times as being ‘bad’ or ‘very bad’, only 36 per cent felt this way in March and April, with 48 per cent suggesting times were ‘average’ and 14 per cent believing times were ‘good’.

Commenting on the survey outcome, Wealth Insights managing director Vanessa McMahon said even though there were still 36 per cent of advisers declaring times to be ‘bad’ or ‘very bad’, the general mood among those advisers had vastly improved in the past couple of months.

“We spoke with many of the same advisers that we interviewed back in February, and even though business is still tough, there is a feeling that the worst is over,” she said. “There is far more confidence among advisers that ‘things will only get better from here’, even though most advisers qualify this.”

McMahon said while business could not be described as booming, it had picked up slightly for many planners, with some investors starting to come back into the market.

“Nevertheless, many advisers expect that most investors will need to build a lot more confidence before they start investing again,” she said.

While the Wealth Insights research revealed that planners were feeling generally better about things in April and May, it also revealed continuing high levels of concern about the overall impact of the market downturn on the their businesses.

It revealed that 50 per cent of planners remained ‘concerned’ or ‘very concerned’ about the impact of the downturn, although the number of planners who said they were ‘very concerned’ dropped from 15 per cent in February to 10 per cent in April/May.

McMahon said many planners still believed they were facing another tough year, but there were far fewer predictions about advisers being forced out of the profession.

She said over a third of advisers expected both their revenue and their profit to be ‘a lot lower’, but she said many still believed they would make a profit.

McMahon said the hardest hit businesses were those that were relatively new and heavily reliant on new business for revenue.