This month marks the fifth anniversary of AMP's takeover of AXA Asia Pacific Holding's Australian operations, but don't expect any fanfare.

The $4.2 billion deal, completed in March 2011, entrenched AMP's status as the country's biggest independent wealth manager, allowing it to supposedly extract unrivalled economies of scale across life insurance, superannuation and managed funds. AMP was seen as a more efficient and profitable operator than AXA in most business segments and the ambition was to lift AXA's margins closer to those of AMP.