More advisers go self-licensed to avoid associative risks

An industry expert said financial advisers are increasingly moving towards a self-licensed model to gain better control of their business, while avoiding the risks of operating under large dealer groups.

My Dealer Services (MDS) managing director Alex Euvrard, speaking at the MDS Self Licensing Summit 2026, highlighted that over one in three (35%) financial advisers now operate within a self-licenced practice, a stark contrast to around only 10% over 15 years ago.

He noted the growth is a result of the intent to gain better control of their businesses, including straying away from risks associated with large licensees.

"Self-licensing has become a major part of the advice landscape, and it tells us something really important, advisers are increasingly wanting control over their business, their advice process, their client proposition and ultimately their commercial future," Euvrard said.

"Advisers are reassessing and looking at the risks of being associated with large advice groups, especially within those groups where there has been reputational compliance failure or instability.

"Recent issues have sharpened that awareness considerably... Associative risk is now a real commercial consideration, not a theoretical one."

There are mediums to also improve operation for self-licensed advisers, including outsourcing specialised capabilities and the utilisation of innovative solutions, he added.

"The modern self-license firm is not simply a small business that happens to hold an AFSL... it is about building the right operating model, knowing what should sit inside the business and knowing what should be supported externally," Euvrard said.

"The best practices will not be the ones who do the most internally, they will be the ones who design the most intelligent operating systems."

Meanwhile, Euvrard highlighted the industry is currently undergoing a "fundamental shift", with some 67 Australian financial services licences (AFSLs) were granted over the past six months. This was a level that was never seen before, he said, further accentuating the intent towards self-licensing.

However, the low number in advice uptake across Australia - only 10.4% of the entire population are seeking advice - compared to similar economies like the US (27%), remains one of the critical challenges for the broader advice sector to scale. This is also exacerbated by the limited supply of new advisers due to stringent education standards and regulatory developments.

Addressing this, Euvrard said the need to for sustainability in the industry will be crucial moving forward.

"If we want a sustainable profession, we need to talk seriously about how people enter, how they are trained and how the profession grows without lowering professional standards," he said.

"The [lack of] advisers... is a clear and linear association with the measure of access to advice. If the population does not grow, access to advice remains constrained."