On a slightly different matter. A friend of mine owned a business and made enough to afford to purchase a property (office cum warehouse) for his business. I asked why don't he buy instead of rent? He said his accountant told him to rent, don't buy, to reduce his tax. He heeded his accountant's advice. 30 years later, he retired, his cash savings was nowhere near the value of the property he didn't buy. Had he purchased the property, at least he has two options - rent out the property for his retirement income or sell it and realise the capital gain (no tax) which far exceeds the tax savings during his business trading years. Penny wise pound foolish, eh?

Great article and points made, Andy. I had to explain recently and demonstrate these very points to a very senior professional trustee. I was instructed by the trustee to "make the portfolio tax efficient." I guess, from a CA point of view, that made sense to her. As luck would have it, the newly appointed CA completing the accounts didn't quite see it that way and agreed with my advice and your article.

Remember that New Zealand did not have bodies overwhelming morgues in the midst of the pandemic so we didn't see a spike in deaths - unlike a lot of other countries. Hence no panic to get cover.

If an adviser has their own FAP license, why would they risk having their client’s data (basically their whole business) held in an aggregator owned CRM?

It should be that onerous. It's a retirement scheme. not a fix the car scheme not a bail out your bad choices scheme the temptation for it to become so grows as balances grow. And KiwiSaver reules must resist it. Every year there will be a new record for withdrawals, because there will be more in it to take, and more people looking to use it. That's not a failure, that means it works.