Collins Stewart Targets High Net Worth Private Clients With NatWest Buy

by Philip Morton, InvestorsOffshore.com

29 May 2001

Collins Stewart Ltd, a London-based stockbroker which also operates offices in Guernsey, Jersey and the Isle of Man, announced last week that it was to buy the private client division of NatWest Stockbrokers, now part of the Royal Bank of Scotland, for up to £17.5m. The deal marks Collins Stewart's entry into private client business and asset management for wealthy private investors in the UK.

The private client business to be acquired has over 6,000 clients, including very high net worth individuals, small company pension funds, trusts and charities, and its assets under management total around £1.3bn. Collins Stewart will pay £11m in cash for the business, plus a further sum of up to £6.5m, depending the amount of client funds that transfer to Collins Stewart within the first 180 days. NatWest will retain its execution-only broking business.

Collins Stewart chief executive, Terry Smith, told FTMarketWatch that the company wanted to invest more money in asset management-type businesses, where the revenue streams are seen as more solid. He was quoted as saying: 'This is the very first building block to do that.' He said Collins Stewart planned to use the acquired NatWest private client division as the foundation on which to build an asset management and private client arm of its own.

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