Count’s Commonwealth Bank remediation provision has been reduced to zero after a final $5.1 million was paid during the financial year, according to full-year results posted to the ASX on Friday.
After CountPlus (since renamed Count) acquired Count Financial from Commonwealth Bank in 2019, CBA provided $520 million to cover remediation of past conduct and as of 30 June, $506 million worth of payments had been made.
“It’s a big milestone for us,” CEO Hugh Humphrey tells Professional Planner.
“Most of it was complete before December, there was a few bits and pieces that ran through the beginning of this year but all of the remediation is complete.”
Count Financial was sold to Commonwealth Bank for $373 million in 2011 before being bought by CountPlus for $2.5 million in 2019 at a steep discount due to the changing advice world after the Hayne royal commission. It came with a hefty remediation bill that the bank undertook to cover.
Humphrey, who previously held the role as executive general manager of wealth management advice at CBA from 2016 to 2019, joined Count two years ago replacing Matthew Rowe.
Friday’s results showed group underlying net profit after tax (which excludes one-off expenses) had increased 39 per cent from $5.8 million to $8.05 million, while underlying net profit before tax increased 56 per cent from $6.8 million to $10.6 million.
Statutory NPAT, which included the one-off costs of the Diverger acquisition and other expenses, was down 55 per cent from $7.5 million to $3.4 million.
Revenue increased by 22 per cent from $91.48 million to $111.8 million, which Count attributed to organic growth and acquisitions.
Wealth division revenue increased 65 per cent from $18 million to $29.8 million. It now was 547 holistic advisers (the full network covers 706 ARs) with more than $34.2 billion in funds under advice, $3.2 billion in funds under management and more than $64.2 million of life in-force annual premiums, as of 30 June.
Count’s headline acquisition of Diverger was completed earlier this year, making it the second largest licensee, now only behind Entireti which picked up the AMP licensees, and transforming the one-time big four bank subsidiary into a major player in the advice space.
Annual research from CoreData presented to the Professional Planner Licensee Summit showed 91 per cent of Count advisers were satisfied with their licensee, well above the industry average of 74 per cent.
Humphrey says he is “energised” about the outlook for the organisation’s integrated model that offers services and equity to financial planning and accounting firms.
“We participate in the value chain in a number of different areas to really magnify the value that we can create, so that’s going to be the focus,” Humphrey says.
The group’s services segment delivered $14.3 million of revenue, an increase of 149 per cent from $5.7 million in FY23. Humphrey says the division is serving “around” 6000 accounting and wealth firms and has been boosted by the addition of offshore services provider Solutions Centric, as well as Knowledge Shop, TaxBanter and Priority Networking from the Diverger deal.
The revenue from equity partnerships decreased 1 per cent from $66.6 million to $66 million, which was due to the $3 million divestment of Bentleys and the merger of two firms into a new entity called Count Adelaide which created a further $2.3 million drag on revenue.
The group has completed 15 acquisitions including Diverger and has investments in 20 firms through its equity partnerships segment.
