Hostplus has been identified as a fund that could make a move in the advice space under Quality of Advice proposals.
Last week, Adviser Ratings shared the top super funds that currently have the most financial advisers that was Aware Super with 137 advisers followed by Industry Fund Services (IFS) at 119.
There are 596 financial advisers working at an industry or not-for-profit super fund.
This is down from 1,191 in 2019, with the biggest losses being seen between 2019 and 2020 when they lost over 380 advisers. This makes up 3.8 per cent of the licensed financial adviser space.
But, looking ahead, Adviser Ratings founder, Angus Woods, said Hostplus could be one to watch out for in the future following its merger with Statewide Super.
Speaking to Super Review, he said: “You are starting to see far more movement at Hostplus since they’ve taken over Statewide Super. Statewide is a semi-large fund with an aged member base so you could see Hostplus look to catch up with AustralianSuper and Australian Retirement Trust on retirement income advice.
“[ART and Australian Super] have intimated they are looking at this retirement space seriously and are looking to take the lead and you’ll see both of them ramp up their efforts there.
“The easy thing for funds to do is to create as many referral partnerships with advisers as possible now which helps bridge the gap until they create a long-term retirement solution which could take three to five years depending on the fund.”
While Hostplus has a young membership with many casual workers in the hospitality space and the average member in their early 30s, the merger with South Australian-based Statewide Super in April 2022 brought across 152,000 members and $11.9 billion in funds under management.
Importantly, Hostplus said at the time, this included members from the local government and public sectors.
As well as Statewide Super, the fund has also merged with Intrust Super and Club Super and is due to complete a merger with Maritime Super later this year.
According to its website, Hostplus already offers an online SuperAdviser advice tool, phone-based super advice, and face-to-face financial planning from specialist financial advisers.
A spokesperson for Hostplus was unable to confirm to Super Review in time for publication how many advisers the industry fund employs or if it plans to hire more in the future.
