Let’s start afresh - it is about future price which is about current perception of profit, page-56

1. Financial planners over the age of 50 are generally glorified insurance salesperson (the type that sell to and charge dead people). They reminisce about the good old days and due to time in industry were always at the top of any "awards" just for "turning up"

Couldn't agree with you more on this. Most of the planners I have ever met over the age of 50 are still stuck in the 'good old days' as you have said where there was no need to ever charge a fee, you just sold a product and got paid extremely well to do so (both upfront and ongoing without the need to service). Worse yet, all of these commissions were grandfathered from FOFA so what we knew was one of the biggest, if not biggest, issue in the industry was allowed to continue to benefit those who did all the hard pressure product flogging in the first place. The grandfathering of this income also meant that financial planning client books continued to be sold way, way above actual value due to not having to service clients.

2. They LIVE for the BOLR. It's everything to them. I remember before I left them they were talking about an EBITDA model and AMP buying into their book. Laughable.

Yep. EBITDA makes complete sense if you were a buyer of the book though (in these days at least). I have a financial planning practice a friends used to work at where they have 11,000 clients and two advisers. How many of those clients do you think actually get serviced lol... Who on earth would buy those clients with the risk of grandfathered remuneration no longer being carved out of FOFA/opt in.

3. The banking arm was ok although I hardly used them as I had deep relationships in private banking arms of the big 4 (and most of my stuff was commercial as opposed to Resi)

Mate who worked at AMP (and one of the reasons I have been so bearish on the company due to his experiences) has his home loan with AMP. He says their service has been good and his rate is better than mine (albeit a staff discount at the time). No issue with attributing value to AMP bank.

4. They would churn clients routinely on insurances. That's a fact. Something that wouldnt be possible going forward given all that's occured

Yep. Aforementioned mate above sent me an email once about how AMP actually wrote to internal advisers offering to pay upfront commission again to move from existing AMP policies to new AMP policies. Its absolutely rife not only at AMP, but most other places as well. I have so many horror stories on this, particularly regarding clients being moved to policies with medical exclusions from policies where they had full cover, just for commission again (whole industry).

5. Financial planners are ugly sisters of the financial world knowledge/trust wise (from my experience). Sorry to any financial planners out there if I offended. I might have just come across a bad bunch (and I used to think my corporate banking teams had there fair share of "Muppets")

Don't be sorry, I am still a financial adviser and I tell everyone the exact same thing. Getting rid of grandfathered revenue couldn't come sooner, education requirements couldn't come sooner and the exam couldn't come sooner. I can't think of an industry where there would be more dead weight making really, really significant amounts of money (albeit thats mostly the 50+ year olds you mentioned earlier who have just bought up books of grandfathered clients and never serviced them).

Frankly, they should get rid of commission all together (including life insurance) but I understand that is a bridge too far for most and makes it hard for a lot of mums and dads to get quality insurance cover if they need to pay a large fee as well as premiums.

The above being said I still believe that this business with the sale of the life/mature business component can actually position itself for growth OR become a takeover target (I believe the latter more likely - but maybe in 12 months once the dust has settled on the RC).

May I ask, what parts of the business do you think you can see growing?

I could see this as a takeover target or growing once they get rid of the mature businesses as you have said, however, I see the share price getting caned further before that happens on the back of some pretty harsh resulting legislation from the Royal Commission. IMO I think AMP will be hardest hit with their very high percentage of grandfathered revenue.