New UK Wealth House Woos UHNW Clients

Tom Burroughes

22 December 2021

Worried about conflicts of interest, hidden fees and befuddled by private bank sales patter? It appears that there is quite a big niche opening up for firms purporting to help ease the pain.

Ultra-high net worth clients may, on the face of it, have the resources to figure out some of these challenges themselves but in many cases they don’t and particularly lack the one thing that no-one has invented – time. And a new UK-based firm, – in 2019. He was group co-chief executive at ITI Capital after then, before starting up Aquarius.

“This project is about changing perceptions around financial services. If you ask people what they think about firefighters and whether you admire them, you will get a 'yes.' It is not the same if you ask about bankers!” he said.

The rise of Aquarius is also a sign of the steady move around the world of people out of banks and into external asset managers, independent advisory shops and family offices. To give one example, Azura, a business founded about two years ago by a former Julius Baer banker, says that it is continuing to expand. In the case of that business, it makes much of how it helps its ultra-wealthy clients, many of whom have significant operational business interests, gain full access to banks’ balance sheets. In Singapore, Switzerland and other regions, the appeal of becoming independent drives business growth. (See a recent look at the Swiss EAMs market here.)

All to play for
A business such as Aquarius has a huge opportunity, says Carvalho.

The firm charges a fee and that is a source of recurring revenue.

Carvalho stresses that this business isn’t a foe of banks at all, but a complement to them. “We aren’t enemies of banks but partners…we are cautious partners. We are giving an independent view to clients to help them compare brands and find clients the best deals. We make sure clients have the right banks in the first place.”

With banks having a lot of intra-structural features, clients may not appreciate the full cost of what they pay in fees.

Soon, Aquarius will be made appointed representatives of a licensed company, which will allow it to operate. In parallel, it will submit an FCA licence request, which takes between six and nine months to process.

This news service asked how Aquarius will position itself when financial firms have shrunk their investment banking/trading functions as capital rules and risk exposures are reined in?

“We will not use our balance sheet, but merely provide advisory services to our clients. All the big banks are not independent. Part of our job is to double check what they are doing and directly advise our clients. We don’t need to differentiate from them because we provide a different service,” Carvalho said.

“What I can say in general is that these large banks are increasingly seen as a commodity as they all tend to provide the same products and services. Our proposition is niche oriented. We collaborate with big banks because our clients need their balance sheet. This doesn’t mean that we will not review and ensure that the service and pricing they are providing to our clients is the correct one.”