St. James's Place plc

St. James's Place Wealth Management plc (branded as St. James's Place) is a British multinational wealth management business primarily based in Cirencester, England but with a network of 23 offices spread across different cities within the UK. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. It is the largest wealth manager in the UK with £142.3 billion under management in 2022.

History

The business was founded by Mike Wilson CBE, Sir Mark Weinberg and Lord Rothschild in 1991 as J Rothschild Assurance Group. In 1992, the company began trading and the Directors of J Rothschild Assurance Group established the St. James's Place Charitable Foundation. In 1993, the Foundation became a UK Registered Charity.

The company was first listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1997 after J. Rothschild Assurance Group acquired the publicly traded St. James's Place Capital, placing it within the FTSE 250 Index.

In 2000, HBOS plc took a 60 per cent shareholding in the business which became St. James's Place Capital in 2001 for £760 million. St. James's Place Capital later became St. James's Place Wealth Management in 2006.

HBOS's stake passed to Lloyds Banking Group, on its acquisition of HBOS in 2009. In March 2013, Lloyds sold 20% of its shareholding in St. James's Place to some institutional investors and sold the remaining holdings in December 2013 for £670m.

In March 2014, St. James's Place joined the FTSE 100 Index. A few months later, the advisory firm Henley Group, which had offices in Hong Kong, Singapore and Shanghai, was acquired by St. James's Place and rebranded to St. James's Place Asia.

In July 2015, St. James's Place acquired Rowan Dartington for £34.2m, which provided discretionary fund management services.

In April 2016, St. James's place acquired Technical Connection, which provided consulting on taxation, trusts, financial products and product development.

In July 2017 an investigation by Which? accused St James's Place of misleading customers on charges. Tom Wilson, author of the article, writes, “There are legitimate reasons why costs might vary – SJP's recommended funds have different charges, so the actual fees will depend on which funds you end up with.” The findings of the investigation were shared with the Financial Conduct Authority. The firm continues to have permission to provide regulated products and services.

In February 2017, it was announced that David Bellamy was stepping down as Chief Executive.

In January 2018, Andrew Croft became the Chief Executive of St. James's Place after spending the previous thirteen years as the company's Chief Financial Officer.

In July 2019 the ombudsman raised "serious concerns", after a client had been persuaded to transfer more than £60,000 to the company, over claims that St. James's Place had "doctored" documents with "forged" signatures to hide the advice allegedly given by the company to the client.

In January 2019, Robert Gardner was appointed as the Director of Investments joining from Reddington.

In November 2019, 14 former footballers sued St James's Place for £15m, alleging that they had received poor advice concerning tax avoidance regarding film and overseas property investment schemes. A spokesperson for St James's Place said, "the partner who pointed the investors toward the plan did not have its authorisation to do so, and that St James's didn't approve of the proposal". The spokesperson also said, "the partner had retired by the time many of the investments were made, and that others were placed through a self-invested personal pension by a third party". According to a court filing, the claim is worth £15 million (€17.5 million). However, St James's says that the statute of limitations on the claims has expired because the investments were made more than 10 years ago.

Prudential's Paul Manduca replaced Iain Cornish as the firm's chairman after its AGM in May 2021. As of the same month, St. James's Place reportedly has over £135 billion in funds under management.

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Companies based in Gloucestershire
Financial services companies established in 1991
Companies listed on the London Stock Exchange
1991 establishments in the United Kingdom