A broker friend sent me a snippet today of IOOF going backwards...

A broker friend sent me a snippet today of IOOF going backwards (a note from Merryl Lynch who have an under perform 12 month stock recommendation) because IOOF have a platform offering which is highly capital intensive and constantly needs to be upgraded as being superseded by the independent platforms.

The bigger boys with their wraps and what not are always lagging from a technology perspective, whilst start ups like HUB have the technology and key people developing regular updates, but need to grow their funds on the platform ......quickly.

It would make sense for IOOF to buy a smaller, independent player, and would make even more sense to buy HUB or at least a stake in HUB for the mere fact that IOOF firstly own 70% of Ord Minnet. And as you know, HUB biggest client is ..... you guessed it ..... Ord Minnet. In timely fashion, Ord Minnet only this week released a broker note on HUB with a buy target of $1.97. Seems like writing couldn't be more visibly ON THE WALL.

Another question is of course, why aren't Ord Minnet using IOOF platforms if IOOF own 70% of them? Seems strange that Ord Minnet have a preference for the Hub24 platform.