AFA News 18 November 2021. On Thursday 11 November 2021, ASIC released their finalised Cost Recovery Implementation Statement (CRIS) that sets out the Funding Levy that applies to each of the sectors that ASIC oversees. As expected, and as announced by the Treasurer and Minister Hume in late August, the Funding Levy for financial advisers has been reduced to the 2018/19 level of $1,500 per licensee plus $1,142 per adviser.
Set out in the detail of the CRIS was the fact that the cost of oversight of financial advisers who provide personal advice to retail clients on relevant financial products in the 2020/21 year was $71.354m, however, the financial advice sector is only being charged $25.8m, which is a reduction of $45.5m.
What is also evident from the CRIS, is that this is based upon 18,750 financial advisers on the register as at 30 June 2021, which is much less than the number that was used in the July 2021 draft CRIS to predict a charge of $3,138 per adviser. On this basis, in the absence of relief from the Government, the charge would have been approximately $3,570 per adviser. Thus, for the 2020/21 year this relief amounts to over $2,400, with a further year of relief yet to come in 2021/22.
Whilst most advisers will think that this is a just outcome, we would like to acknowledge that this is one of the benefits of the advocacy work that has been done by a range of stakeholders including the AFA. For any questions on the ASIC Funding Levy, please email policy@afa.asn.au
Issued 18.11.2021. AFA Policy & Education Update
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