Small schemes put on weight as KiwiSaver hits 16 Investment News

Start-up KiwiSaver schemes accrued about 1.3 per cent of market share, or about $1.2 billion since the 2018 year, the latest Investment News NZ annual survey of the sector shows.

The free ‘Vote KiwiSaver’ report shows the 10 schemes launched since 2018 have signed-up about 40,000 members between them, again equating to roughly 1.2 per cent of the total 3.2 million plus scheme members as at March 31 this year.

To date, the Pie Funds-owned Juno – registered in July 2018 – has been the most successful of the new-breed schemes, reporting more than 18,500 members and $478 million under management by period-end.

But while Juno (along with Nikko – another 2018 vintage scheme) went backwards during the 2022/23 period, a handful of other challengers stepped up headed by Aurora, InvestNow, Kōura and Pathfinder.

Aurora, supported by a group of about 70 associated financial advisers, was the fastest-growing KiwiSaver scheme for the second year in a row, adding more than 150 per cent in funds under management over the 12 months.

And after a sluggish couple of years since going live in 2019, Kōura caught a boost after interests associated with a large financial advisory network, NZ Financial Services Group, took an almost 50 per cent stake in the firm last year (joining Hobson Wealth on the share register). Kōura added over 1,100 members in the 2022/23 year – more than twice the membership figure of 861 recorded 12 months previously.

Elsewhere, InvestNow continued where it left off last year, signing on more than 1,300 new members, almost doubling in size.

“Kernel, another low-cost passive provider to rival Smartshares and

Simplicity, established a scheme in April but only started taking

money months later,” the report says. “And Sharesies, of a similar demographic to Kernel, has yet to release its full KiwiSaver platform.”

Download the free KiwiSaver report for a more in-depth look at how the 38 schemes from minnows to top dogs performed across a range of metrics over the 12-month period – 16^th in the series.