My Dealer Services continues to thrive despite falsehoods about the self-licensing model
Alexander Euvrard
Self-licensing specialist My Dealer Services (MDS) is continuing to grow strongly as interest in the self-licensing model for advisers blossoms despite a concerted campaign against it.
MDS Director and Founder Alexander Euvrard said his firm had maintained leadership in the self-licensing space over the past financial year by facilitating 30 percent of new AFSLs in the country and hosting the first Self Licensing Summit open to all financial advisers.
MDS now supports 130 self-licensed AFSL holders and 450 advisers who manage more than $20bn in funds under management.
In the industry as a whole, more than 30 percent of Australian financial advisers now operate within a self-licensing model and interest in the model is growing because of its obvious benefits of greater control and freedom from the yoke of larger licensees, Mr Euvrard said.
During the past year MDS also rolled out a tranche of additional service offerings to its members including platinum partnerships with Morningstar, CFS and Paradino, a gold partnership with HUB24 and a silver partnership with Atlas Outsourcing.
Head of Strategy, Ashley Mahadeea said MDS’s partnership programme had a step change in FY2025-2026 and delivered even more value to members who now enjoy support from 20 service and product provider partnerships.
“By leveraging our collective scale, we’ve secured exclusive discounts and preferential pricing that would be difficult for individual AFSLs to access on their own. But our commitment goes beyond just cost savings. We know that our members’ time is invaluable, which is why we invest significant effort in researching and vetting best-of-breed solutions across the marketplace. Our mission is simple: to ensure that they have access to tools and services that drive real efficiency gains,” Mahadeea added.
Mr Euvrard said in the year ahead MDS would be stepping up its advocacy for the self-licensing model in the face of concerted opposition.
“Larger adviser groups see self-licensing as a growing threat and have launched two recent attacks against it. The first was these large groups using the façade of a Financial Services Council whitepaper to call for the lifting of the minimum ASIC levy for licensees to $25,000 while reducing the per adviser fee.
“This was a clear shot at the thriving self-licensing community which consists of much smaller adviser groups, often with only two or three advisers. If implemented, this proposal as measured per adviser, would make self-licensing roughly 14 times more expensive than sitting under a large licensee, which would be an unwarranted barrier to entry to the fastest growing part of the advice market.
“The second assault was the release of a CoreData report recently which claimed that 23% of self-licensed executives were weighing a move back to a licensed model. However, a survey our 450-strong member base in the last week found 95% firmly said no to going back to a large licensee model,” Mr Euvrard said.
“Perhaps the biggest myth about self-licensing is that it costs a lot more to be self-licensed than being an Authorised Representative of a larger dealer group. The truth is that with careful cost management and the use of efficient external support services, many self-licensed advisers find they can achieve cost parity with what they were paying in dealer group fees.
“The big difference and benefit is that they gain control of how they deliver advice and administer compliance. Self-licensing can be a source of competitive advantage for boutique firms and solo advisers who possess strong business management skills, have stable revenue, and a commitment to maintaining high ethical and compliance standards.
“Importantly, self-licensees get to build and promote their own brand without the constraints of being part of a larger group. The key is having the right support network and business structure, not necessarily to be a large size,” Mr Euvrard said.
