In the UK, FCA-regulated retail investments account for just 5% of total financial assets, according to the ONS Wealth & Assets Survey. Yet, you wouldn’t know it from the way the financial services industry behaves. Too often, we’re led to believe that investing in this fund or that ISA is the defining factor of financial well-being. It isn’t.
Financial assets are only one part of the wealth picture. The more significant part is human capital—your skills, knowledge, and capacity to earn and contribute. And wealth itself is just a means to an end. That end is holistic well-being: financial security, emotional fulfilment, physical health, and environmental sustainability.
From a holistic wealth planning perspective, whether a client holds Investment A or Investment B makes marginal difference. What matters is whether their overall life goals are being met—whether their financial architecture truly supports their desired life outcomes. Whether clients self-manage or delegate their investments also has negligible long-term impact in a properly constructed lifetime cashflow forecast.
Yet when the world is viewed through the narrow lens of the FCA’s regulatory perimeter, that perimeter is mistaken for the entire world. It isn’t. The FCA’s focus is product-centric because its scope is limited to regulating financial products and services. But financial education, in its truest sense, is not about products—it’s about empowering people with knowledge, skills, and self-efficacy to live well.
The FCA’s advice-guidance boundary is often misrepresented. Within that context, “guidance” typically refers to non-advised product sales—still a form of selling, just without the accountability of regulated advice. Both are sales-led. True education is something else entirely: it’s equipping individuals with the understanding and confidence to plan their own lives, not just their money.
Recent FCA commentary about ‘finfluencers’ reflects this tension. The regulator wants “legitimate providers” to occupy social media space to “crowd out bad actors.” But let’s be honest: there’s a conflicted narrative at play. When financial services firms step into education, it’s often little more than veiled marketing. The FCA admits the need for people to help others navigate complex financial decisions but still frames the boundary in terms of product promotion compliance.
Meanwhile, finfluencers—often independent voices offering genuine financial empowerment—are being squeezed out, even as they may represent the only barrier between consumers and an industry too frequently driven by profit over people.
This is what happens when regulatory objectives are captured by the government’s growth agenda: the focus shifts toward enabling the industry rather than protecting consumers. The only thing standing between ordinary people and the City’s commercial interests are those same independent educators and campaigners.
We need to take off the rose-tinted glasses and see the situation for what it is. We need to rewrite the narrative in fair and impartial terms. The future isn’t about simply pushing more products—it’s about real education, real empowerment, and real ethics.
Until we address that, financial well-being will remain out of reach for too many, and the transformative potential of true holistic planning—centered on people and planet—will continue to be side-lined by those profiting from the status quo.
Your Money or Your Life
Unmask the highway robbers – Enjoy wealth in every area of your life!
By Steve Conley. Available on Amazon. Visit www.steve.conley.co.uk to find out more.
Academy of Life Planning 