Brown, the FMA's head of primary regulatory operations, spoke at a Workplace Savings NZ and Women in Super breakfast in Auckland this morning, where she outlined what providers should expect from the new regime.

Compared to its predecessor the Securities Commission, the FMA is "much more focused on the top of the cliff," she said, although she acknowledged the FMA couldn't, and shouldn't, stop every failure,

"One of the things that does keep me awake at night is where the next thing is going to come from."

She said a big part of this focus would be compliance monitoring, which would be about "looking at the providers themselves, not only the providers but QFEs and auditors and statutory supervisors and the NZX.

"These are effectively front-line regulators so the interest we have in these people is different to those who go straight to the retail market."

Brown said there were a number of models being used to sell KiwiSaver and it was important to strike the right balance in order to maintain innovation.

"We will talk to some market participants to see how their distribution model works in practice," she said, adding that the FMA would be focusing on "information-only" sales.

However, she said there was no clear line separating information-only advice from personalised advice.

"Context is vital; the definition of personalised advice points towards context."