Male domination in the world of financial services may finally be giving way to an increase in the number of female financial advisors, although it's going to be a while until anything approaching parity is reached.
According to data from Cerulli Associates,7.9 percent of financial advisors were women in 2012. That figure jumped to 11.5 percent last year, offering a contrary view to a trend reported last year in a Pershing study that saw women leaving the industry rather than joining it.
While Pershing estimated at the time that the number of women advisors was considerably higher than the Cerulli study did, it also said that one key to growth for financial services businesses in general was the recruitment of women to serve as advisors.
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According to Cerulli, banks, at least, have listened. Women among their ranks number a far higher 33.3 percent than in the field as a whole, with the next closest percentages found at broker-dealers (15.6 percent) and wirehouses (15.4 percent).
Cerulli attributes the growth in the number of female advisors to new advisors entering the field — something that makes sense, considering that last year another Cerulli study said that the financial advisory field would shrink 8 percent by year-end 2017.
Demand also has no doubt played a role in the increase in female advisors. That 2013 Pershing study said that women investors were not only more likely to hire an advisor at all (46 percent) than male investors (34 percent), but that they preferred to work with women who didn't pigeonhole them.
It also said that newly divorced women were more likely to seek advice because they felt the advisor who had worked with them when they were part of a couple gave them less service and attention, focusing instead on their husbands.
Another fact to consider is that, according to Cerulli, 43 percent of advisors are approaching retirement age. The growing departure of male advisors from the field could open the way for a greater influx of women, who, despite their current small numbers among the advisory population, made up 50.8 percent of the U.S. population in 2013, according to the Census Bureau.
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