Why did the Kiwi cross the road? Over the 12 months to June 30 2014, just over 150,000 KiwiSaver members changed schemes. Photo / Thinkstock
Why did the Kiwi cross the road? Over the 12 months to June 30 2014, just over 150,000 KiwiSaver members changed schemes. Photo / Thinkstock
Due to technical issues (children), my annual KiwiSaver scheme survey, which collates data from 35 annual reports, failed to beat the official government version of events into print.
As reported last week, the Financial Markets Authority (FMA) made a big deal about the increasein inter-scheme transfers in its annual KiwiSaver report.
Although my study only identifies about $1.1 billion in scheme transfers over the 12 months to March 31 compared to the $1.4 billion in the FMA report, this does represent a year-on-year increase of $400 million or so.
By my reckoning, scheme transfers (disregarding mergers) accounted for about 6.2 per cent of total KiwiSaver funds under management (FUM) as at March 31, 2014, compared to 4.2 per cent the previous year.
However, figures from the IRD provide an alternative view of the transfer trend as measured by member numbers. Over the 12 months to June 30, 2014, the IRD records just over 150,000 KiwiSaver members (the FMA reports 170,000) changed schemes, up 23,000 over the last year.
While the transfer trend is definitely slanting up, by proportion of overall KiwiSaver membership, the 2014 figures are not the highest on record. In fact, the IRD stats show that during the 2009/10 year almost 8 per cent of KiwiSaver members - or over 115,000 individuals - switched allegiances. Transfer figures the following year were almost as high.
I suspect the 2009/10 peak coincided with the rise of now-defunct Huljich and the infamous Mr and Mrs KiwiSaver, which signed up members for the Fidelity scheme.
Without these competitors - both of whom were warned off by the regulator for aggressive member recruiting tactics - banks have an easier run of it these days in the transfer market.
Today AMP plus the banks (if we include Fisher Funds with its TSB shareholding) own 85 per cent of the KiwiSaver market.
