Tom BurroughesThis week’s £12.8 million (around $20.7 million) purchase of UK’s Eden Financial by Canada-headquartered Canaccord is another stage in the latter firm’s push into the European wealth management market. There may be more deals, a senior executive says.
Canaccord, which in March bought Collins Stewart Hawkpoint and hence acquired the latter’s Collins Stewart Wealth Management business, has this week boosted CSWM further by adding £835 million of assets by acquiring Eden.
“Canaccord ultimately has further ambitions to grow its UK/ Europe wealth management platform. However, the current focus will now be on successfully integrating the Eden business into CSWM,” Neil Darke, chief executive of Collins Stewart Wealth Management, told this publication in an interview.
“CSWM has been pursuing a strategy laid out four or five years ago when I took it over, to double its assets to £10 billion in assets under management by the end of 2012 through organic and inorganic growth. This latest [Eden] deal will take us to around £9 billion,” said Darke.
“CSWM has known the management of Eden Financial for some time; this is not two strangers meeting at a bar,” he said. "There is good chemistry and we believe a good cultural fit between the two businesses. In due course, we would like to move Eden’s clients assets onto our in-house administrative and custody platform. They [Eden] currently use an external third-party platform,” he continued.
Acquisition
In the acquisition, Canaccord will pay a consideration of up to £12.8 million in cash, of which £7.68 million will be payable upon completion and up to £5.12 million after 12 months, subject to revenue retention and revenue mix thresholds. The acquisition is subject to approval by the UK’s Financial Services Authority.
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