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After working and talking with numerous financial planners, many have expressed their opinions that this is needed in the industry to ensure ethics in the industry are upheld between the adviser and their clients, ensuring clarity of the service and products.

In respect to the comment of "Advisers with insufficient portfolio management skills (Experience) will be at a distinct disadvantage" there are alternative solutions for advisers and their clients. Instead of advisers being disadvantaged and paying retail rates for average and underperforming managed funds, there are products on the market that enable the adviser to empower their business and their client's portfolios.

A change in practising from the old ways is needed, we will see advisers benefiting their clients, themselves and the financial industry. The financial services industry is changing, expectations of the clients are too, and so will the products that are on offer to the retail market. The question is: Who will be the leaders?

What's more important than ever are Independent financial products that don't seek to vertically integrate, are independent, trustworthy and incorruptible.

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Don't forget, Romic is also a salesperson not just a consultant or commentator - this would perhaps explain why he is downplaying adviser ability in terms of portfolio management - solution - DFS Portfolio Solutions. Romic may also be confused about what a product is, ASIC have their own definition and he is certainly selling one, managed accounts.

Selecting a managed account is not a strategic decision but a product decision. If Romic were a retail financial adviser (is he?) he would perhaps understand better that a first-year apprentice builder is probably better served in CBus than a managed account solution that may require an SMSF - irrespective both would have a price tag which would need to be considered in light of the benefits.

An adviser needs to be able to defend their recommendation and prove that it is in the client's best interest - this would be down the individual client and how their best interests are served - not Romic's philosophy around value investing and bias to his managed account sollution.

Being a financial adviser is not a question of picking either strategy/planning advice or product advice - almost every strategic decision involves product choice (whether one product, another or none) even if a recommendation to change a product is not made then a recommendation to retain the existing product is inferred.

Best Interest Duty dictates that strategy and product go hand in hand, ignoring strategy and you are just selling product - fortunately most advisers are beyond this. Ignoring product though and there is no consideration for the best interests of the client.

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