Our People
Our team are our asset in achieving our goals for our customers.
Robert Cumming
Founder, CEO
Bachelor of Agricultural Economics (Hons),
Graduate Diploma of Financial Planning
Robert worked for a bank and two multi-national food manufacturers with working experience both in Australia and overseas. He trained as a financial planner in 1996 before founding HNW Nexus in 1999. Rob is a Chairman of HNW, a Responsible Manager and Executive Financial Planner. Rob has a passion for coaching and developing new financial advisers to the industry and has a passion for understanding small cap Australian companies.
Rob is married with 3 adult children and when not in the office you can see him keeping young and fit riding many bike tracks across the Coast or checking out all the great restaurants Terrigal has to offer.
Gary Walker
Group General Manager
Qualifications in Financial Advice, Coaching,
Development and Leadership.
After spending time working for multi-national technology companies, Gary followed his father into the financial advice industry in 2001 and spent over a decade as a Financial Adviser before leading large advice businesses for Westpac, BT Financial Group and Anne Street Partners. Gary worked as a consultant for a number of years focusing on compliance, practice growth and M&A before taking stewardship of HNW in 2021. Gary has a passion for client satisfaction and ensuring profitability of Financial Planning practices.
Gary is married with 2 young children and when not in the office you will find him driving dad’s taxi to dance, singing, karate, drumming or parkour lessons.
David Hamblin
Operations Manager
With a background in design and graphics, David has been involved in share trading using technical analysis since 2003. Having managed departments in a large international scrapbooking company, David has now been with HNW since 2008 and is in charge of everyday operations. He holds a Bachelors’ Degree in Design (Industrial Design), and a Diploma of Financial Planning.
Married with two children, David enjoys spending downtime with his family, designing gadgets, composing music, finding humour in everyday life and writing fiction. He is not a black belt in karate.
Jon Alchin
Launch Manager
Prior to joining HNW, Jon worked as a financial adviser developing and establishing a national Financial Planning network and later a Newcastle based firm. He actually enjoys economics and reading and researching these both locally and internationally, and tries to make investing easy to understand.
When Jon is not in the office you may find him travelling to discover fantastic hidden less accessible places in Australia or on a cricket field believing he still has the abilities of a teenager (and then he whines every Monday about how sore he now is). Jon is married and has a son who keeps him busy.
Dylan Ferguson
Financial Controller
Dylan worked for a chartered accounting firm before joining HNW Nexus in 2016 as the Financial Controller. He holds a Bachelor of Commerce with the University of Newcastle and is currently studying a MBA with the Australian Institute of Business. Dylan has a passion for improving reporting to add value to businesses.
Dylan and partner have two young daughters and when not in the office you can see him going on bushwalks or taking the family down to the beach.
Cary Frost
Compliance Manager
Cary worked for a major Bank when first out of school and developed a passion for helping people understand the world of finance. He trained in financial advice in 1997 and worked for both major corporations and himself over the next 22 years before moving into the Compliance and Technical services space in the financial advice industry. He commenced with HNW as the Compliance Manager and is also a Responsible Manager for the organisation.
When not working, surfing and live music are his passions and occasionally you will see him behind the microphone at a karaoke function and is known as the practical joker in the office.
Peter Rumsey
Team Manager - SYNCRM
A drastic change from being a panel beater in a former life, Peter now pursues a passion in all things technology from his main role as Team Manager for SYNCRM. Peter is a jack of all trades when it coming to information technology and developing the current and future functionality of the SYNCRM software that powers HNW Nexus.
Cassandra Johns
Full Stack Developer
As the treasurer of a board game society at University, Cassandra is a classic tech nerd. She is studying a Bachelor of Technology majoring in Algorithm Design and Data. She has a passion for spotting patterns in numbers and consolidating information into "pretty graphs".
In her spare time, Cassandra is often playing board games with friends and appreciating the world around her with photography.
Jaidyn Cumming
Business Analyst
Jaidyn spent a great portion of her life as a professional ballet dancer including being part of Ballet Nacional Sodre - The National Ballet of Uruguay, however, when the COVID-19 pandemic started, she decided to return to Australia to commence tertiary studies. Her current studying of Environmental Engineering and Computer Science is the perfect combination of mathematics, system optimisation and creativity to keep her thoroughly busy.
In her spare time, Jaidyn enjoys spending time with family and friends, cooking new meals, and admiring her plants – whether they be real or made of Lego.
Abbey Falzon
Trainee Accountant
Abbey has lived on the Central Coast for her whole life and after completing Year 10 an opportunity was presented to join the Financial Services industry on a traineeship. She is currently completing her Cert 4 in Accounting and Bookkeeping.
When not in the office you can either find Abbey with her friends and family or going to the beach.