Towry to launch online services

The chief executive of Towry, the acquisitive wealth manager and financial planner, says the group is close to launching online services for its clients, as it reveals sharp increases in assets under management and revenues for 2014.

The move illustrates how wealth managers are trying to adapt to a world of widespread smartphone and tablet adoption, where clients expect to be able to manage more of their finances online.

Rob Devey, who joined the group a year ago, said: "We, like many other wealth managers, have been a face-to-face driven service. The whole of the services industry is changing, people's expectations are changing. The iPad has changed everything. We need to respond to that."

Initially Towry's online services will focus on letting clients see portfolio valuations and make minor portfolio adjustments but further down the line clients will be able to complete transactions as well.

Towry's assets under management increased 15.4 per cent during 2014 to £6.4bn and revenue increased 10.3 per cent to £91.3m, according to the latest results for Towry Holdings Limited just published at Companies House.

This was driven by both organic growth and takeovers such as its acquisition of Bluefin Personal Consulting from AXA UK in September 2013, and that of Baker Tilly's private client financial advice and investment management business, which was announced in April 2014.

In March Towry, which is backed by private equity firm Palamon Capital Partners, struck a deal to buy rival Ashcourt Rowan for £97m.

These deals drove an increase in Towry's operating and administrative expenses for 2014 from £64m to £72m.

Mr Devey said the firm was unlikely to do another acquisition on the scale of Ashcourt Rowan this year but added that the logic that drives these deals - creating economies of scale in an environment of rising costs - remains valid. "I think that every single player in the business is thinking about its size, its scale and who it could work with," he added.

Insurance companies and private equity are attracted to wealth management's relatively stable revenue streams underpinned by the demographics of ageing populations and pension reforms that mean that retirees no longer have to buy an annuity.

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