AMP aligned business further grows SMSF footprint
SuperIQ, the SMSF administration business 49 per cent owned by AMP, has acquired the troubled SMSF administration offering from listed Australian financial services company Tranzact.
In its financial results posted to the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) in late September, Tranzact said it experienced an impairment write down on its SMSF administration business of $967,000, and “sustained a loss of client funds greater than expected”.
This came amid plans for a broader scale down of its Australian and New Zealand financial planning businesses following a strategic review.
The latest announcement continues the acquisitive strategy of SuperIQ, which itself acquired former Perpetual SMSF offering Smartsuper in September last year.
Terms were not disclosed* for the latest transaction, which was announced to the ASX late yesterday
SuperIQ general manager Peter Lalor said the agreement is “good for Tranzact’s SMSF customers and good for SuperIQ”.
“Tranzact’s SMSF customers will have access to SuperIQ’s market-leading SMSF administration service and technology platform, and SuperIQ will benefit from increased scale. Increased scale will allow us to continue to invest in enhancing services for customers, advisers and accountants,” he said.
“We will begin to engage with advisers and trustees that have been using Tranzact’s SMSF service today to understand what they value and how we can use the capabilities of SuperIQ to improve the experience they have with SMSF administration.”
He said the transition to SuperIQ should be smooth for trustees and advisers.
“We have become quite experienced at migrating funds, trustees and advisers to our offering, having now completed a number of acquisitions like this one. Acquisitions continue to be an important part of our growth strategy and we are constantly looking for more, or in discussion with potential sellers” Mr Lalor added.
SuperIQ has now been operating for almost two years after launching its service at the end of October 2011.
***update***
The proceeds of the sale of approximately $1.35 million compares with the written down carrying value of $2.15 million, as at 30 June 2013, according to Tranzact. "Consequently, the sale will result in a non-recurring write off of $800,000 in the current 2014 financial year," the company said in a statement.
