Vale Josh Bronkhorst
[Obituary] Josh Bronkhorst. Josh passed away recently after a short battle with cancer. Good Returns Publisher Philip Macalister reflects back on Josh's time in financial services.
Wednesday, September 30th 2026, 10:58AM
My last meeting of last year was lunch with Josh Bronkhorst out at Link Financial Group's head office on Auckland's North Shore.
It had always been great to sit down and have a yarn with Josh. But now he’s gone.
A few weeks after our lunch, I got a call to say Josh is stepping aside from running Link due to health reasons. It stunned me considering everything seemed pretty normal at our lunch in December.
In a rather understated way Josh changed his profile on LinkedIn to say: "Taking a break to focus on my health."
It turned out he had incurable stomach cancer.
Josh spent more than 30 years in financial services, first in South Africa and then in New Zealand.
His career didn't start in finance. After studying law, Josh spent about seven years working for the South African government as a public defender. He then moved to one of South Africa's large insurers as a legal adviser.
Working alongside advisers and their clients, he found he preferred the client work to the legal work. He became a financial adviser and, after several years as a tied agent, set up his own brokerage in Johannesburg.
After moving to New Zealand, he held business development and national sales roles at Fidelity Life and Sovereign, where he oversaw the mortgage division. He later became senior business manager at Newpark Group. At Sovereign he came to see how central property was to New Zealanders and how central the mortgage industry was to that.
When the chance came to invest in Mortgage Link, one of the country's earliest adviser aggregators, Josh took it. He went on to set up Insurance Link and FG Link, the group's fire and general arm. In 2017 he formed Link Financial Group (LFG) as the holding company, later adding Invest Link.
He also backed technology. With Matt Gilbert, he co-founded Advice Link, a New Zealand-built CRM for advisers. It passed 500 users, a target Josh had set himself and is now used across both LFG and NZ Home Loans.
In 2022 NZ Home Loans, part of the government-owned Kiwi Group, took a majority stake in LFG. Josh kept a shareholding and stayed on as chief executive. The group supported more than 200 adviser businesses writing close to $3 billion in lending a year.
Josh summed up his approach as, "good old-fashioned hard work; rolling up my sleeves and getting stuck in." He often cited golfer Gary Player's line that the harder you practise, the luckier you get. The most rewarding part of the job, he said, was watching inexperienced advisers who joined the group turn into established business owners.
Under his leadership, LFG stuck to an adviser-first model. Advisers could choose to operate under the group's licence or independently, and the group invested heavily in compliance support and professional development as regulatory costs rose.
When he took ownership of Link, I have to be honest and say, for me, it wasn't clear the group had a future, despite its long history.
How he proved me wrong. Link Financial is now the third biggest mortgage aggregation group in New Zealand. He transformed it into a multi-disciplinary group with branded and non-branded options for advisers. He got NZ Home Loans, ultimately owned by the government, on board as a shareholder because of several things, including the advice-tech the company built. NZ Home Loans now fully owns the business.
Link is one of the few groups who have a shareholder with serious capital behind it to grow. But, in my mind, more importantly, it is the whanau Josh created with his members. The relationships were more than just business transactions for him, they were something deeper.
His former executive assistant, Angela Spearpoint, posted on LinkedIn when she left that her time with Josh and Link was, “One of the most rewarding and professionally enriching chapters of my career.
“Working alongside Josh allowed me to grow, develop and operate at a level I am truly proud of. We built a strong, collaborative partnership grounded in trust, alignment and genuine respect. Supporting him was a privilege I never took for granted. Being able to stand beside him, keep things moving and ensure he was supported in every way I could was one of the most meaningful parts of my career."
“Josh had a remarkable way of empowering the people around him. His leadership, his encouragement and the trust he placed in me were truly inspiring. He is so incredibly admired by those who have had the privilege of working with him.”
In the same vein NZHL Group Chief Executive Kip Hanna said; "Josh made a significant contribution to LFG and our industry, but what I'll remember most is the way he connected with people."
"He genuinely cared about advisers and their success and was always generous with his time, advice and support. Even in the face of illness, he showed remarkable courage and dignity. He will be remembered not just as a leader, but as a mentor, friend and someone who made a real difference in the lives of many advisers."
I was personally absolutely delighted to see Josh awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Financial Advice NZ conference at the start of this year. My only disappointment was not being there to celebrate with him.
While we worked in the same industry, we had a few other bonds. Josh was sporty, playing rugby when he was young. But being a bigger guy, like myself, that took a toll. We also talked running as he’d completed the legendary Comrades Ultra Marathon in South Africa.
One of his passions was the YMCA basketball Challenger series which he’d sponsored for the past six years. On its Facebook page, YMCA said, "Josh’s support has meant so much to the Challenger Series and to the young basketball players, coaches and teams who have been part of our competition over the years. His commitment to supporting basketball and helping create opportunities for young athletes has left a lasting impact on our community."
Josh spoke openly about his illness. Earlier this year, after chemotherapy and immunotherapy were no longer effective in treating his stomach cancer, he travelled to Shanghai. There he became the first international patient to begin treatment with a newly approved CAR-T cell therapy for solid tumours. He told the Wall Street Journal that, "this was by far the best option I could find." He returned home in August.
Glen McLeod, an adviser who was close to Josh and ended up working for the group said: “For more than 20 years, Josh was a constant presence in my life, both personally and professionally. The impact he had on so many people will be felt for years to come. While we mourn the loss of an exceptional man, we are grateful for the privilege of having known him and worked alongside him. His legacy lives on in the business he helped build and in the many people he inspired, mentored and supported throughout his life.”
Personally, I'll remember Josh as a man who built a great business; a person who always had a smile; a generous guy who would give his time and always invite me to events.
In a nutshell - a bloody good bloke!
Rest in peace mate.
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