This article was originally published in GoodReturns and has been reproduced in its entirety here.
https://www.goodreturns.co.nz/article/976505600/qualitative-reports-class-advice.html
Research provider FundSource will be able to deliver its reports direct to retail investors, now that they are classified as financial advice.
Monday, July 10th 2017, 6:00AM 
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by Susan Edmunds
It now has 36 qualitative fund reports available for nine fund managers.
In an update, head of FundSource Glen van Echten said the business could now classify its qualitative reports as class advice, which meant they could be given direct to retail investors. The information is available on the FundSource website.
Fund manager John Berry, of Pathfinder, said that was good news for product providers and investors.
“As class advice it is not personal to any single investor but applies to the category of investors who may be interested in a particular fund,” he said.
“Now that FundSource are comfortable the research papers are class advice we can make them available to all investors. Previously they were only available to wholesale investors. More information in the hands of investors to help with decision making is a good thing – particularly when it is a research driven analysis of an investment product.”
FundSource has also entered into a partnership with Strategi to provide trainee advisers with free access to the FundSource Investor hub, along with access to all FundSource qualitative research reports while they are studying with Strategi.
The business has been through a period of change over recent years.
In 2015, it dropped its qualitative research functions when it partnered with Financial Express on a quantitative tool. Then it entered a strategic partnership in which Darren Howlin, managing director of research at unlisted managed funds service Research IP and former research manager at Lonsec, to conduct the qualitative research on FundSource’s behalf.
It issued its first qualitative report under that arrangement last May.
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