- Managing partner: Ian Pryor (29)
- 700 clients (income S$300k+ or S$2m assets)
- 26 advisers
- Persistency 90%
- Indemnity comm
- Providers: Zurich International Life, Skandia International, Friends Provident International, Generali International, and Aviva
After his initial foray into Asia, Expat Advisory Group (EAG), a specialist division of IPP Financial Advisers, was established in April 2008 by Pryor with Roger Tunstill and Michael Wong.
Local market
Over 95% of the circa 700 clients in EAG are expatriates and Pryor says the rest of the IPP group almost exclusively cater for the local market. EAG’s clients are looked after by 26 advisers, which is small in the context of the 400 in IPP as a whole with its S$2.3bn assets under advice.
But the expat clients cut above their weight as the huge majority are ‘accredited investors’ with income upwards of S$300,000 in the preceding 12 months or net worth of S$2m or more. This is a MAS-defined term, where funds are registered with the regulator as ‘AI-Restricted’ in similar vein to professional investor status in Hong Kong or sophisticated investor status in the UK.
Pryor says last year’s figures showed there was a good product mix in client portfolios, and persistency for EAG was over 90% across all insurance companies. Though a holistic approach is taken to financial planning, the biggest focus of the business is on private pensions and investments.
Product providers
In terms of product providers, most of EAG’s business goes to Zurich International Life, Skandia International, Friends Provident International, Generali International, and Aviva (in the order of proportion)
As for remuneration, Pryor uses indemnified commission “for a lot of what we do” and he points out that upfront payments are an important help with start-up companies.
He says he will review the way IPP advisers are remunerated when MAS decides on its position here, whether that be imposing a fees only environment or not.
However, he has implemented charging structures that utilise a commission sacrifice but have an increased trail fee, or annual management charge attached.
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