Field is committed to continue the work of APFA, including its review of the shake-up of the FSCS levy, and the association’s director general Chris Hannant will join the IMFA for its first year as a strategic adviser.
“Across the piece, we will also be looking at the value of advice as APFA have started some research, which they are looking for sponsorship for, and we will pick that up,” she explained.
“How valuable is advice? That plays very much to the overall theme that the WMA has been looking at over the past year, which is how to do we promote a culture of savings and investments”
Field confirmed the name of the WMA Private Investor Indices will change, though the composition of these benchmarks is unlikely to be amended.
She said: “I need to understand a lot more about what the needs of the financial advisers are before we make that call. In the short term, they won’t change and we will work with MSCI and our firms on a timetable that is suitable to change the names.”
Field stressed a desire for the IMFA to be a “common voice” working on behalf of private investors.
“There’s the two of us, now in to one, talking about the private investors we already know.
“In a landscape of 14 main trade associations in the financial services sector, we are the only ones that talk about the private investor. I think in terms of talking to the government, we will now be able to do this in a much quicker and streamlined way.”
