The week's news... condensed

And five big stories this week were...

For independent financial advisers, the dominant story of the week was AIFA's decision to let in restricted members.

With the expectation that a large number of advisers may end up choosing the restricted route post-RDR, the move seemed to make sense, although plenty were not impressed.

A number of big players in the advisory and platform industries came out to lend their support to a five-year ‘sunset clause' on legacy commission.

Skandia said it could help to prevent poor customer treatment, although the FSA continues to insist it could lead to advisers being paid twice for the same work.

A couple of interesting, RDR-related developments for some big players. St James's Place failed to make any profit from its distribution arm in the first half of 2011 and blamed the impact of the review.

Meanwhile, Openwork announced a pilot programme with 15 advisers to move them to a fee-charging model, ahead of a rollout to all its members by the end of the year.

The ongoing political standoff over the US debt ceiling was at the top of the news agenda throughout the week, with the clock ticking towards the 2 August deadline.

With some warning a US default could lead to a global recession, the International Monetary Fund was keen for the White House and Congress to get a move on.

Almost a fortnight ago, the Treasury Select Committee urged the FSA to delay RDR implementation to avoid an exodus of advisers from the industry.

This week, however, new Aviva research seemed to indicate the actual numbers may end up being much less than originally expected.

And finally...

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