Advisers earned £4.4bn in revenues from retail investment business last year
Advisers earned almost four times more revenues from retail investment business than mortgage broking last year, new data has revealed.
Statistics submitted to the Financial Conduct Authority from a range of intermediary firms showed that revenue earned from retail investment advice fell by one per cent year-on-year to £4.4bn in 2020.
In comparison, reported revenue from mortgage broking fell by 4.2 per cent to £1.22bn.
Read more: FCA launches new diversity consultation for listed companies
However, both were dwarfed by insurance advice, which raked in £18.62bn last year – a year-on-year increase of 1.2 per cent.
There were 5,017 firms offering retail investment advice last year, 4,205 offering mortgage broking services and 10,306 offering insurance advice.
Among those firms providing retail investment advice, those providing independent advice accounted for 61 per cent of revenue earned from adviser charges, up from 59 per cent in 2019. Those providing restricted advice accounted for 39 per cent.
Read more: Andrew Bailey declined £40,800 bonus when he left the FCA
The share of retail investment revenue accounted for by commission dropped from 16 per cent in 2019 to 14 per cent in 2020, the City watchdog said.
The reported number of retail investment adviser posts across all firms fell slightly from 36,401 in 2019 to 36,377 in 2020, with posts at financial adviser firms accounting for 76 per cent (27,501) of these.
Within these, firms with more than 50 advisers accounted for 49 per cent of all adviser posts in 2020, a rise from 47 per cent in 2019.
Read more: Rise in people carrying out business without FCA authorisation