M and A
Societe Generale To Sell UK Asset Management Unit - Report
Paris-listed Société Générale has put the UK arm of its asset management division up for sale and could announce a deal as early as next week, the Financial Times reported.
The business is the smallest of SocGen’s four regional asset management units, with £8 billion under management and employing 126 people.
SocGen declined to comment when contacted by WealthBriefing.
SocGen has a total of €300 billion in assets under management, down from €358 billion at the end of last year. Of this amount, it has €188 billion is under management in Europe, €83 billion in the US and in Asia, €27 billion.
SocGen is the latest in a series of European banks to look to sell all or part of its asset management arms.
Rival bank Credit Suisse has put its conventional long-only fund management business up for sale and is in talks with Schroders and Aberdeen Asset Management. Santander, the Spanish bank, put its fund management arm up for sale in the summer but has yet to find a buyer.
The FT story did not mention the French bank’s private banking operations in the UK or how, if at all, they might be affected by such a disposal.
If a sale is concluded, it would be the first shake-up of the division under Jean-Pierre Mustier, the former head of SocGen’s investment bank, the FT said.
Mr Mustier was moved aside in October to head the global investment management and services division after January’s rogue trading scandal in which Jérôme Kerviel, a marketmaker, placed €50 billion ($70 billion) of allegedly unauthorised bets on financial markets.
The scandal cost France’s second-biggest bank €4.9 billion and incurred a record fine from the French regulator for “serious failings” in its controls.
SocGen’s asset management business accounted for 18 per cent of total group net profit of €947 million in 2007.
SocGen’s London business was re-launched in 1998 after the group brought in fund managers Nicola Horlick, Keith Percy and John Richards.
The team started out well and attracted clients. But it was hit hard when markets fell in 2000. Ms Horlick left in about 2003.
Keith Percy, who became chief executive, outlined plans to double the firm’s assets under management over the next five years.
