The new business intends to address an “advice gap” in the UK.

Clove, a new UK “challenger” in personal finance and wealth management, has exited its stealth phase, and said it has secured a $14 million pre-seed funding round.

(“Stealth” refers to a temporary state of secrecy used by a startup to develop a product or service away from competitors and public scrutiny before an official launch.)

The funding was led by Accel, with participation from Kindred Capital, Air Street Capital and notable angel investors, including Barney Hussey-Yeo (CEO and founder, Cleo), Patrick Pichette (former chief financial officer, Google) via Inovia Capital, Erez Mathan (chief revenue officer, GoCardless) and Gideon Valkin (ex-Monzo and ClearScore).

Clove will use the money to continue building its team and platform with a view to a full launch in 2026, once authorisation by the Financial Conduct Authority has been given.

Created by tech founders Christian Owens (UK payments unicorn Paddle) and Alex Loizou (ecommerce marketplace Trouva), Clove is on “a mission to close the financial advice gap, which affects hundreds of millions of people globally and can both restrict economic growth and lead to worse financial outcomes for individuals,” a statement from Clove said.

Giving its business case, Clove cited figures from the FCA which show that the wealth of people who receive financial advice can rise by up to 10 per cent in the years following financial advice versus those who aren’t advised.

“A huge section of society has been failed by the financial advice industry, because it is only able to serve those that are already wealthy,” Christian Owens, CEO and co-founder of Clove, said. “Today, less than one tenth of the UK population benefits from professional financial advice, and half of advisors have stopped servicing fewer wealthy clients.” 

In the UK alone, 13 million mass-affluent individuals hold £3.8 trillion ($5.05 trillion) in investable assets. This includes more than 3.7 million UK consumers who are both open to receiving professional financial advice and have more than £50,000 available to invest. The FCA estimates that there are seven million adults in the UK with £10,000 or more in cash savings who may miss out on the benefits of investing throughout their lives.