Equity Story says it’s struck a key new agreement which vastly expands the company’s range of financial services in Australia, delivering another key milestone in the firm’s post-IPO strategic expansion.

Equity Story Group (ASX:EQS), the Aussie-listed trading advisor, educator and fund manager, says a new 100% subsidiary Equity Story Securities Pty Ltd has been established to provide expanded financial services by entering into a Corporate Authorised Representative (CAR) arrangement.

The latest official nod gives EQS license to expand its services well beyond providing general securities advice only, and moves the company into offering specific  financial product advice, and will see the EQS team of experts moving into actionable financial product guidance to retail and wholesale clients.

CEO Trent McGraw says with Equity Story becoming an AFSL Corporate Authorised Representative (CAR),  the freshly-listed EQS – which already provides stock market advice, research, investor education and management services – can now broaden and deepen its capacity to meet the needs of both retail and wholesale investors here in Australia.

ASIC has advised Equity Story Securities Pty Ltd that it holds representative number 001297372.

Following the agreement, Equity Story Securities Pty Ltd is authorised to provide financial product advice to retail and wholesale clients across a variety of financial product classes – and crucially – EQS can also deal in a financial product to retail and wholesale clients by trading in financial products on behalf of another person across financial product classes like servicing Managed Investment Schemes, Investor Directed Portfolio services and Securities trading.

 

Expanding verticals

From way back in February EQS already had designs on growing out the business into new revenue verticals by expanding regulatory licensing in Australia and the United States.

The latest news follows a string of strategic achievements EQS has been steadily knocking over since listing back in February. Only last week EQS cracked open the US market, with the US Securities Exchange Commission officially green-lighting United States SEC financial licensing.

“EQS has now delivered on these regulatory expansion initiatives,” McGraw told Stockhead.

“This month’s SEC registration was also an important milestone for Equity Story’s global expansion. Such a key regulatory approval enables our team to offer EQS content, podcasts and training courses to Americans,” he said.

It’s understood that Equity Story is possibly the only ASX listed business of its kind that holds US Investment Adviser Firm status.

“This also consolidates our long-term strategy to build a fully-licensed financial content platform across a number of international markets.

“And now this Australian licensing expansion now provides EQS with options to deliver a whole range of extra revenue verticals, just as the company aimed to deliver in its pre-IPO prospectus,” he added.

These include, but aren’t limited to:

  • Deploying a charting and/or trading execution platform;
  • Providing direct access to on-market ASX equity placements, IPOs and other capital raising opportunities to Equity Story members
  • Partnering with complementary service providers under a revenue share or fee split arrangement to provide expanded service offerings to subscribers; and
  • Providing general advice on the company’s own Managed Fund offerings

“Equity Story is now better positioned to execute our growth initiatives,” McGraw says.

EQS plans to roll out  the new range of services throughout the next financial year, kicking off soon.

 

This article was developed in collaboration with Equity Story Group, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.

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