ING Australia to acquire Financial Services Partners group

ING Australia (INGA) today announced it will acquire the FSP Group, which includes Financial Services Partners, the third-largest independent dealer group in Australia, as well as FSP Funds Management and FSP Portfolio Services.

INGA will pay in excess of $50 million to acquire 100 per cent of the FSP Group. The acquisition propels INGA into an industry leading position for aligned advisers, with over 1500 advisers in its distribution network.

As part of the acquisition, Tandem Financial Advice, a specialist dealer group 100% owned by INGA, will be integrated into the FSP Group.

The new combined group will be called Financial Services Partners and will comprise 110 firms with 222 advisers and 300 support staff. The current FSP management will remain in place, and FSP’s current CEO, Geoff Rimmer and Chairman, Dr Frank Wolf, will lead the combined group.

Together with Tandem, Financial Services Partners will have $62 million in gross brokerage and fees, $5.5 billion in funds under advice and $750 million in gross inflows and $80 million in-force risk.

The CEO of ING Australia, Paul Bedbrook, said: “FSP is a fast-growing financial services group with a strong network of advisers, a high quality management team and a sound business model, where the interests of clients, advisers and the dealer group are all aligned.

“We believe ING Australia is the ideal partner to enable the FSP Group to accelerate its future growth potential and to capitalise on its business model. Financial Services Partners will have access to the full suite of ING products and support services which will enable the business to realise its full potential.

“The integration of Tandem advisers into the new FSP Group will deliver increased scale and benefits flowing from the larger organisation.”

The Managing Director of Tandem Financial Services, Andrew Doquile, will assist with the integration process and then depart once this has been completed.

Commenting on the integration, Mr Doquile, said:“There are considerable benefits for all Tandem advisers, both financially and professionally, in the new integrated group,

“Tandem advisers will have significant input into strategy and operations in the combined group and will have representation on the investment and risk committees, as well as the platform and product steering committees.”

Mr Bedbrook said the acquisition of the FSP Group would enhance ING Australia’s distribution footprint and boost INGA’s total aligned adviser network to 1500 advisers, one of the largest in the industry. INGA’s adviser network includes Millennium 3 (600 advisers); ANZ Financial Planning (432); RetireInvest (220); FSP (222, including Tandem) and ING Financial Planning (30).

The Chairman of FSP Group, Dr Frank Wolf, said: “We are delighted to be joining ING Australia and we look forward to working with the management team to integrate the FSP platform into INGA.

“We also look forward to welcoming our new colleagues from Tandem into the FSP Group and working with them to create a world-class advice and service offering to our customers. Financial Services Partners is a client and adviser centric business. We strive to provide access to outstanding support services and product opportunities for our advisers who in turn provide advice and services to their clients.

“By focusing ultimately on client outcomes, Financial Services Partners believe we are able to assist our advisers build strong business platforms in what is a highly competitive marketplace.”

It is expected that the acquisition of FSP Group will be finalised  early in the New Year.