UK wealth manager and aggressive IFA acquirer Bellpenny has acquired Essex-based Unizone.

UK wealth manager and IFA acquirer Bellpenny has acquired Essex-based Unizone. It marks Bellpenny’s 22nd acquisition since it was founded in October 2012 and means assets under management now total £2.8 billion ($4.4 billion). 

Unizone itself has more than 2000 active clients and £330 million of funds under management, split evenly between pensions and the investment business.

Employees of Unizone, including financial planners and more than 20 support staff will join Bellpenny. Unizone’s existing office in Coggeshall will be retained, under the Bellpenny brand, and becomes a third regional hub, alongside those in The Midlands and Glasgow.

The move is an example of how some IFA acquiers such as Bellpenny and Focus Financial, among others, have snapped up advisory businesses that are looking to sell or forge partnerships to cope with the rising costs and changed landscape in the wake of new regulations, principally stemming from the Retail Distribution Review.

"It is no coincidence that we’ve completed two of our largest deals to date - Unizone and Torquil Clark - within the last couple of months. In the immediate aftermath of the RDR it seemed mainly to be smaller firms considering their exit options. However we’ve recently seen a surge in interest from owners of larger businesses looking to de-risk and release capital," said Kevin Ronaldson, chief executive at Bellpenny.

Bellpenny is backed by Oaktree - a US based investment manager.

"A recurrent theme in recent discussions with IFA owners is the inexorable downward pressure on profit margins. One effect of this is that they’re having very carefully to reassess the cost of advice, which means it’s inevitable that some clients will be priced out of the market. Economies of scale mean larger firms are able to give more clients access to financial planning expertise, whether face-to-face, over the phone or online," said Dominic Rose, acquisitions director of Bellpenny.